When my friend called me on the morning of 17 May about a fire near Charminar, I assumed it was a minor incident. But as the hours passed, it became evident that it was, in fact, a raging inferno that had engulfed a building and trapped its occupants.
An entire family of 17 died – stuck inside the Gulzar Houz building in Charminar, unable to exit. Telangana fire safety DG Y Nagi Reddy said that the first call to the fire department was received at 6:16 am, and a fire engine was dispatched “just a minute later”. But residents say that the fire had probably started much before anyone noticed, making it hard to control by the time help arrived. It had, by then, grown to such a scale that even the multiple trucks dispatched later couldn’t curtail it.
With all this in the background, it is important to note that the Old City of Hyderabad, and other densely populated market areas in the city, are just sitting ducks for fire accidents. Like the above family – which ran jewellery shops on the ground floor of their residence – many business owners typically live above their establishments.
Such buildings are often poorly constructed – without following fire safety norms – making them prone to mishaps. The fact that firefighters took hours to get in points to the failure of both the public and government authorities. The public is often unaware of fire safety norms, and government bodies struggle to enforce them.
While many people have blamed the tragedy on the fire department’s ‘late arrival’, it is important to understand that the responsibility for such incidents goes beyond mere response time. It is the Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) that gives permits for such buildings. The fire department is consulted only for high-rises or structures over 15 metres in length. The GHMC, thus, is as much to blame for this as anyone else.
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Focus on fire safety
Safety measures should be implemented even in smaller buildings and single-storey structures, the fire department officials I spoke to said. “Short circuits due to heat are a common occurrence, which is why the incident numbers go up in summer. In the Old City, businessmen and shops invest more in CCTV cameras to prevent theft but forget their own physical safety despite impending dangers posed by buildings constructed close to each other,” a senior fire department official told me.
In fact, a former fire department director general I know shockingly found that almost every building in the city was flouting fire safety norms. While newer buildings, constructed with more space around, were made to comply with guidelines, older buildings in densely populated areas continued to bypass rules, he revealed.
The incident at Gulzar Houz is also a very important lesson for the trading class in the Old City – either focus on fire safety, or risk losing your businesses. While we all love to romanticise old buildings and shoddy structures that look ‘aesthetic’, sometimes, such places are plain hazardous.
Unsafe buildings that are on the verge of collapsing are a major concern. The city will eventually move on from the 17 May incident, but if something isn’t done to rectify the root of the problem, then this tragedy really wouldn’t be the last.
Hyderabad’s population density has surpassed Delhi’s, but, according to the fire department official I spoke to, it has just 20 fire stations. This is also a big reason why the firefighting at Gulzar Houz took so long. The initial fire tender was just not enough.
If we had more fire trucks, particularly in heavily populated areas such as the Old City, this incident could have been averted. I hope the government realises the gravity of the situation and works toward tangible change. Otherwise, we can only hope such disasters don’t happen again.
Yunus Lasania is a Hyderabad-based journalist whose work primarily focuses on politics, history and culture. He tweets @YunusLasania. Views are personal.
(Edited by Zoya Bhatti)
