The Hindu : New Delhi News : Survey to identify hazardous material stored in godowns

Online edition of India's National Newspaper
Friday, Feb 25, 2005

New Delhi

New Delhi

Survey to identify hazardous material stored in godowns

By Sujay Mehdudia

NEW DELHI, FEB. 24. Shaken by the unnecessary loss of life and property in recent fires across the Capital, the Core Group on fire safety has directed the Municipal Corporation of Delhi and the Delhi Fire Service to carry out a survey within a week to identify hazardous material stored in the 900-odd "illegal godowns" in various parts of the Capital. It has also directed that a list of slum clusters with more than 1,000 jhuggis be drawn up to put in place fire protection measures.

The Core Group under the leadership of the State Chief Secretary, S. Regunathan, was constituted by the Lieutenant-Governor, B.L. Joshi, after the Kirti Nagar fire that claimed ten innocent lives including nine fire personnel. Launching an action plan to bring about a sense of semblance in adherence to fire safety measures, the Core Group directed that a survey be undertaken for one week from February 23 to March 2 to identify the material stored in major godowns located in various parts of the Capital. It was directed that the list of items stored in the godowns indicating whether they are hazardous or inflammable or not has to be clearly indicated. The survey will also point out the quantity of goods stored in the godowns.

The whole exercise, according to officials, is meant to get some idea of the type of goods stored in the godowns in order to enable the Government to frame a policy in this respect.

It is understood that the survey will also point out the status of these godowns. It is learnt that a preliminary survey has revealed the existence of nearly 900 illegal godowns in the Capital storing various kinds of material including hazardous, of which even the godown owners have no knowledge. A majority of these godowns are also learnt to be storing chemicals that are presently banned under the Delhi Municipal Corporation Act and are understood to be owned by leading transport companies of the Capital.

The areas that are going to come under scrutiny of the authorities include Kamla Market, New Qutab Road, Nabi Karim, Loha Mandi, Naraina, Roshanara Road, Wazirpur Industrial area, Bhalaswa, Burari, Sanjay Gandhi Transport Nagar, Nangal Deva village, Kailash Nagar in Shahdara (South) zone, Vishwas Nagar in Shahdara (South) zone and Yamuna Vihar area in Shahdara (North) zone.

On the other hand, the Core Group also expressed concern over the frequent fires in the slum clusters and the lack of proper passage for the fire tenders that often hamper fire-fighting operations. The Core Group constituted a committee consisting of the Additional Commission (Slum &JJ), one representative each of the Delhi Fire Service and Delhi Jal Board to prepare a list of large slum clusters of above 1,000 jhuggis to find out the need for putting in fire protection measures there. The committee would identify the filler points of Delhi Jal Board in large vulnerable slum clusters and compile the list. The Core Group felt that keeping in mind the problems of access to slum clusters and of reversing the vehicle for water replenishment owning to extreme congestion, it would be essential to install filler points at locations identified by the Chief Fire Officer in these JJ clusters. These filler points would as far as possible be located in the vicinity of the police posts in the clusters to secure the same against tampering.

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