Kumbakonam, India ? Parents of the dead went home, silently weeping. Others sat in the sun Saturday outside a hospital, hoping their children would survive burns they suffered in a school fire in southern India that killed 90 children.

Many were the first in their families to go to school, escaping generations of illiteracy in this country, where one-third of more than 1 billion people still can’t read or write.

The fire Friday at the private Lord Krishna Middle School was sparked by dry coconut leaves used as firewood at a makeshift kitchen, which prepared free food subsidized by the government.

Poor, Indian families have increasingly come to rely on private schools, paying a tuition fee that ranges from $5 to $100 a month.

Tens of thousands of ill-equipped private schools have mushroomed across Indian towns and cities in the past decade, as the cash-strapped government cut spending on education and stopped building additional schools to curtail its burgeoning budget deficit.

Public schools, while often better equipped than private schools, can be miles away, and impossible to reach on foot.

Almost all of the children at Lord Krishna Middle School came from poor families, and the grieving parents included menial laborers, shopkeepers, low-paid government servants and villagers.

“I have lost everything I had,” said Simon Anthony Dass, a porter, who lost both his sons — 15-year-old Aravind and 9-year-old Anish Kumar. Dass had never been to school, and had hoped his children would have a brighter future.

He said witnesses told him Aravind had initially escaped, but returned to the burning building to rescue his younger brother. Both died.

M. Selvi, right, relative of Kanaka Priya, 7, and Kirti Wasan, 12, who died in a school fire, grieves at their graves in Kumbakonam, about 215 miles southwest of Madras, India. Parents cremated the already charred bodies of their children on Saturday after a devastating fire that swept through a primary school at Kumbakonam, killing at least 90 children.

By Friday evening, 45 bodies had been cremated in mass ceremonies. The rest were cremated Saturday.

Many injured were still being treated at the town’s 390-bed, government-run hospital.

Residents of Kumbakonam, 1,300 miles south of New Delhi, India’s capital, demanded action against the culprits.

“This was sheer murder,” said M.A. Kumar, who sweeps the town’s streets for a living. “Those responsible for this must be hanged.”

Police arrested five school officials: the principal; his wife, who is part of the school’s management; his daughter, who helped run the school; and two kitchen workers. They are being held on negligence charges.

In the wake of Friday’s fire in Tamil Nadu state, its top elected official, Chief Minister J. Jayalalithaa, ordered safety inspections of all schools in the state.