Hyderabad: Safety at stake

Hyderabad: The seven-floor head office of the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) adjacent to the Tank Bund road and which is the authority to issue fire safety certificates to buildings, does not have workable fire safety equipment right now.

More than 1,200 employees work in the GHMC head office and lack of fire safety in such a huge building poses a major risk to the staff in case any fire accident takes place. The GHMC, it is learnt, also did not conduct any fire safety drill in the recent past though there were fire hydrants and pipes. No awareness on the measures the employees should take in case of fire has also not been created in the recent past.

When The Hans India tried to contact the officials, the GHMC authorities were not available to comment on the fire safety issue at the GHMC head office.

But a close look at the fire extinguishers in the GHMC building shows that date of about 35 Co2-filled cylinders expired four months ago and not even a single extinguisher was replaced with new one till date. The date of expiry mentioned on them is July 19, 2021.

Officials in the corporation say that the private agency which is supposed to maintain them had not taken necessary steps. It is not known as to what measures the GHMC had taken to ensure the safety of its employees.

According to the label pasted on the fire extinguishers, the last inspection was done on July 12, 2020 and the extinguishers were refilled with fresh CO2 (carbon dioxide) on July 20, 2020. The next refilling date is July 19, 2021.

According to the safety norms, all the extinguishers should be refilled every year ensuring the fire extinguishing gas is energetic. "If they are not filled with new gas in a two weeks period after the expiry date, the effectiveness of the extinguishers to douse the fire will be almost zero.

Technically, all the extinguishers are not in use in the GHMC office," an expert in the Fire Services department of the State government told The Hans India. It is the responsibility of the EVDM (Enforcement, Vigilance and Disaster Management) wing of the corporation to maintain the fire safety equipment of the entire building, sources said.