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Pune district hospital functioning sans Fire compliance
Without meeting the prerequisites for the No Objection Certificate (NOC), the facility is not safe even for its employees, including doctors
PUNE
Despite the notable risk posed to the lives of visiting patients and their families, the Public Health Department-run Aundh District Hospital (ADH) has been operating without fire compliance for the previous two years. Without meeting the prerequisites for the No Objection Certificate (NOC), the facility is not safe even for its employees, including doctors.
The ADH, the only tertiary care hospital of the Public Health Department in the Pune district, managed to evade the state government’s 2021 pan-Maharashtra fire safety audit of hospitals.
The installation of a fire protection system with regular maintenance, electrical maintenance, fire safety and electric safety audit and building structure compliance with staircase, refuge area, and emergency exit amongst multiple other compliances is yet to be met by ADH, informed the fire officials of Pimpri Chinchwad Municipal Corporation (PCMC).
The ADH has over 3,000 visitors to the hospital on a daily basis. On average over 1,000 patients seek treatment at Out Patients Department (OPD) section, while more than two hundred patients are admitted to different wards of the hospital.
The hospital also employs about 500 people, including doctors, nurses, and other personnel. Despite such a significant daily footfall, the authorities, however, have turned a blind eye to public safety.
Dr Nagnath Yempalay, district civil surgeon and head of ADH, said the electrical safety and maintenance work is awaited from the Electric Department of the Public Work Department (PWD) and changes for fire compliance are pending for the Building Department of PWD.
“The PWD had recently conducted the repair and maintenance work for the structure and electricity, and the update regarding this has been submitted to the Fire Department of PCMC. We are hopeful that we will soon get the fire NOC from the PCMC,” he said.
Yempalay further added, “To be safe and handle any untoward fire incidents, we had recently conducted a mock drill at the hospital. We have around 30 fire extinguishers in the hospital premises and have even conducted a fire audit in 2021.”
A senior officer from the Fire Department of PCMC said the PWD and hospital authorities met us two weeks back asking for the Fire NOC.
“There are multiple discrepancies that we found during the last visit to the hospital. The hospital has to complete the compliance for the structure, electric, and fire safety to get the NOC. However, the hospital will take at least two more years to complete the compliance to get the NOC from us,” the official, on condition of anonymity, said.
