In the narrow lanes of Vivek Vihar in East Delhi, where buildings are packed tightly enough to share both light and shadows, the early hours of Sunday were broken by screams. From the first-floor balcony of the home where he has lived since 1984, Gurdeep Singh Gill watched the fire begin around 3.30 am. It was a flicker on the second floor of a neighbouring building which, within minutes, turned into something else entirely. “There was no space for people to get out,” Gill said hours later, standing outside the four-storey, seven-year-old building where the tragedy had struck. Most of the eight flats in the building are owned rather than rented. At the back, where the fire broke out, the balconies had been sealed with metal grills, and some were covered by plastic netting.The stairwells were narrow and enclosed. When the fire brought flames, smoke and panic, the incremental additions to the structure, to grab space to dry clothes or keep potted plants, became life-and-death barriers.…