After dance bars, police get tough with Mumbai’s orchestra bars, demand fresh fire safety audits

Audit reports from fire brigade a prerequisite to renew licences of 294 orchestra bars in city; licences come up for renewal every year

After cancelling licences of three functional dance bars in Mumbai for their failure to furnish fresh fire-compliance certificates, the Mumbai police have turned their focus on orchestra bars.

The condition has been imposed on orchestra bars following the Kamala Mills fire (in pic). (HT Photo)

The police’s headquarters (II) branch, which issues the Premises License (PL) to orchestra bars to conduct business, has asked 294 orchestra bars in the city to furnish fresh No Objection Certificates (NoCs), or audit reports, from the fire brigade as a prerequisite to renew their licenses. Orchestra bars’ licences come up for renewal every year, and costs Rs2,000.

Sources in the police said the move comes in the wake of the devastating Kamala Mills fire, which claimed 14 lives and left dozens others injured in December 2017, a consequence of the lack of fire audits and non-compliance of fire safety norms.

The condition has been imposed on orchestra bars keeping in mind that the NoCs submitted by these establishments are old and outdated, submitted when they first applied for the licence, in many cases almost two decades ago.

“The Kamala Mills fire has made it imperative that we revisit all establishments, including orchestra bars, and check their fire-safety compliance status in order that we avoid such mishaps,” said a senior police official.

Sachin Patil, deputy commissioner of police, HQ II, made it clear that fresh fire compliance certificates are mandatory for renewal of orchestra bar licences.

During a recent evaluation, the police found that in many cases, orchestra bars have continued to use the fire NoCs given to the establishments in whose place they have come up. “The fire NoC given to an orchestra bar has to be specific to the orchestra bar, and not, for example, to the barber shop that was there earlier. The dynamics of fire safety arrangements are different for different places,” Patil said, adding that such orchestra bars have been asked to furnish fresh establishment-specific NoC from the fire brigade.

Orchestra bars that already have establishment-specific NoCs must submit a fire audit certificate issued by the municipal corporation, along with their licence renewal application. As per Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) rules, all business establishments have to undergo a mandatory audit by the fire brigade every six months. Following the audit, the BMC issues a fire compliance certificate.

Earlier this week, on Wednesday, the police cancelled the licences of the only three functional dance bars in the city — two in Andheri and one in Tardeo — after they failed to furnish fresh NoCs from the fire brigade despite reminders in the past one year. The dance bars had been granted conditional licences, following a 2016 Supreme Court order during the course of a protracted hearing on a petition filed by the dance bar association challenging the state government’s blanket ban on dance bars in 2005.

Orchestra bars, where the performance is limited to singing and playing music, survived the state government ban and have continued to operate in Mumbai. In fact, many of the erstwhile dance bars had morphed into orchestra bars, following the ban.