NEW DELHI: Former Team India captain M S Dhoni, Batsman Dinesh Karthik and other players from Jharkhand and Tamil Nadu teams had a scare when the Dwarka hotel, where they were staying, caught fire on Friday morning.

All the guests were safely evacuated as 30 fire tenders battled for two hours to control the blaze that broke out around 6am on the ground floor. The fire was doused off before it could reach fourth floor, from where the premises of WelcomHotel begin and go up to the 12th floor.

It is learned that the players and officials had no idea about the fire till smoke filled the rooms and galleries. No alarms went off, they said. Dhoni was at the breakfast table when the smoke got very heavy.

"As I opened the door of my room, I saw thick smoke. All players were texting each other and came out of the hotel. Mahi bhai was with us and ensured we didn't panic," Jharkhand's leftarm spinner, Shahbaz Nadeem, told Media.

Jharkhand's match against Bengal, which was to start at 9am at the Air Force ground, Palam, was called off due to the incident and it will now be played at the Ferozeshah Kotla on Saturday.