E-Paper
Order on safety drills puts Fire Dept in a fix
THE DISTRICT fire service authorities are a worried lot following the radiogram issued on April 11 by principal secretary (Home) Satish Kumar Agrwal directing all the districts to ensure fire safety drills.
THE DISTRICT fire service authorities are a worried lot following the radiogram issued on April 11 by principal secretary (Home) Satish Kumar Agrwal directing all the districts to ensure fire safety drills.
On receiving the directive, the fire department passed the instruction to all the fire stations, asking them to submit a report of their safety drills within a fortnight.
The order has put the district fire service department, which is running short of manpower and equipment, in a dilemma. The district fire station officers feel that lack of resources, including man power and authority to punish the guilty, have put them in a tight corner. A fire officer, on condition anonymity, said, “They have performed many fire safety drills earlier too, but they had no effect on the guilty, as the department officials were not authorised to punish the guilty.
They said, “In such a situation safety drill is going to be an extra burden.”
“Kanpur, which is a major industrial city, has only five fire stations with nine fire tenders. With this limited, resources the department is providing fire safety cover to a population of about 45 lakhs. Therefore, about nine lakh people are being covered by each fire station,” the sources said. The sources suggested that to give proper fire safety cover, one fire station should be established for a 50,000 people. “Besides, the department should be equipped with the latest fire safety equipment,” they said.
