Fire incident has many lessons for the government

What was supposed to be a get-together of a jeweller’s family marking the summer holidays ended on a tragic note with 17 members of the extended family getting killed in a devastating fire that engulfed their house in Hyderabad’s over congested Gulzar Houz, a mere 100 metres away from Charminar on an ill-fated Sunday. The intensity of the fire, apparently triggered by a short circuit, was such that the dense smoke proved the killer as the victims died due to smoke inhalation; none had any burn injuries on them. It is an irony that the three-floor house had only one narrow entry point and there was virtually no emergency exit, which ruled out any possibility of the trapped persons attempting to rescue themselves. Incidentally, this is not the first time that such a calamity has occurred in the Old City and sadly that will not be the last one either. Apparently, the authorities don’t believe in the ‘once bitten, twice shy’ phenomenon even as the city stares at many such catastrophes.

The fact of the matter is that this is a direct fallout of the inept and shallow officialdom and their apathy to anything that concerns the well-being of the citizens. It is a sad commentary on Indian administrative functioning that officials are ‘awakened’ only after calamities, most manmade and hence avoidable, strike and kill countless people. The rescue operations are also not to the levels required. For instance, in the latest case, many locals from the neighbourhood alleged that the fire engines that were pressed into service had run out of water (strongly denied by a senior fire official) and locals had to bear the brunt of sharp voltage fluctuations, a bane across all areas in the Old City. It is baffling that officials do not show any interest in making life safer for people in Old City localities, where primate constructions and narrow staircases come across as life-threatening risks. What our learned politicians do is announce ex gratia, express deep concern and condole the aggrieved families. Beyond this, these honourable gentlemen do nothing. That is the ground reality, take it or leave it.

The question is who is to be blamed for the Gulzar Houz tragedy? Was it the family or the absence of fire safety equipment in the building that had only an entry point or the authorities as a collective whole? Whether this is taken with a pinch of salt or otherwise, the fact is that everyone must be blamed-the property owner (they don’t check for safety norms), builder (who gives a damn), electricity, municipal and other civic officials and the state government’s brazen policies that always favour the elite sections. They should understand that giving doles by way of welfare schemes does not suffice, lives must be protected, first and foremost. The Old City does not need metro connectivity for all the conveniences it provides; the region needs to have strong houses that can meet the best of safety standards. A wise move would be to demolish the existing dilapidated buildings in a phased manner and construct new liveable structures. A major contributory factor to the continued risk factor is that there is absolutely no coordination between the municipal, electricity, water works, HMDA and town planning wings. Each is busy playing the blame game and pointing fingers at one another, even during floods and building collapses. The state government should come up with an all-powerful HYDRAA-like department that can monitor all civic related departments and make them work as a transparent closely knit unit. Each should be made accountable and the errant employees punished on charges of criminal offences.