A quarrel between a man and a woman led to a pre-dawn fire on Tuesday which claimed the lives of the woman's two children and left at least 450 people homeless, the Penang Fire and Rescue Department said today.

The department's report on the Noordin Street Ghaut blaze doused widespread speculation that the fire was deliberately started to get rid of a squatter colony there that was standing in the way of the delayed Jelutong Expressway.

Officer in charge of operations Nazri Zakaria said the department's investigation found that a man who had quarreled with Umi Kalsum Harun, 38, whose two children died in the fire, had committed the arson. The man is not related to the family.