Is your child's school protected against fire?

Of 1,450 schools and colleges in city, a mere 248 inspected for fire safety; no clear data available on the rest

Has the spurt of fire mishaps in the city in the past few days made you wonder if the school your child attends follows fire safety measures adequately? Or whether there is a safe emergency exit for children in case a catastrophe presents itself?



Government and civic authorities would do well to check these details, experts recommend.

But, in an inspection last year, of the 1,450 schools and colleges in the city, a mere 248 were inspected, and it came to light that officials had to send recommendations for improving safety to all of the inspected institutes. The rest are yet to be checked.

Chief Fire Officer Uday Tatkare said, "There is no data on how many schools or colleges are not following the measures.

When we inspected the state board schools in the city last year, we had sent all of them a list of recommendations as per their structure and the standard guidelines. We will begin the inspection drive again this year."

An official from the fire brigade, on condition of anonymity, said, "In 2010, a mass drive was undertaken by the Mumbai Fire Brigade to check whether educational institutions were following the preventive measures for fire safety as dictated by the Supreme Court."

Of the 800 schools and 650 colleges in the city, 248 state board schools from A Ward to the G-South Ward were checked.

Lack of data

MiD DAY decided to speak to various parties involved in fire safety at these educational institutesfrom the civic authorities to the institutes' management and experts on the matter.u00a0

And we found that no concrete measures have been taken to make the buildings impervious to a fire breakout. Moreover, there are no substantial records available to assess how many are bending the rules.

Expert says

N V Merani, who headed the Merani committee appointed on September 11, 2008 to study and report the safety of life at public places like hotels, workplaces, malls and complexes, said, "Like malls and multiplexes, even educational institutions need to have a regular inspection.

But it is disheartening to know that the state has not yet acknowledged the Merani committee report, or the general committee report, which made clear recommendations for the security of life at schools and colleges."

He added that other than following the standard guidelines of fire safety like keeping extinguishers and having exit passages, their maintenance is equally important. Also, mock drills should be carried out for the students.

Officials speak

Civic and state authorities either pass the buck or give standard replies to questions about fire safety.
BMC's Education Officer Abasaheb Jadhav said, "We do not carry out any such inspection from our end but the state education directors do have an account of this."

M V Deshkmukh, director, State Fire and Emergency Services, and fire advisor to the Government of Maharashtra, said, "There is not enough staff in the fire department to carry out periodical inspections.

Recruiting more people would mean using taxpayers' money." He continued, "Every year, schools and colleges have to send us a self-certification of the fire measures they have carried out, so we do not send officers to every institute.

Officials do pay a surprise check to some of them though, so institutes remain alert and do what is needed in a responsible manner."

He added that his department does the inspection proactively. "Any residential, commercial or educational building has to register itself with the chartered license agencies every six months and then provide their self-assessed certificate to the agency," he said.

Sunil Chauhan, deputy director, State School Education, said, "Before a school gets an affiliation from the education department, it needs to have a firefighting system in place.
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A Supreme Court ruling made it mandatory after a major fire broke out in a Chennai school in 2004 (see box). The SC had then issued an order on fire safety and no school has broken norms since."

He added, "We inspect schools every year."

Management speak

On their part, schools' administrators say they do what they can to ensure children's safety, despite there being no official pressure to keep tab on the measures they undertake.

Pareen Bagli, principal, New Activity School, Peddar Road, and regional secretary, Association of Indian School Certificate Examination (ICSE), said, "When the school goes for an affiliation to ICSE council it has to follow the fire safety norms, which require that the school have one fire extinguisher in each laboratory and one on every floor.
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Though there is no inspection by fire brigade officials, the schools individually take care of fire safety. We have a contract with CEASE Fire Company and they provide us cylinders for extinguishing and check for gas regularly.
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There are also fire drills in schools where school staff and students are taught how to react to any mishap and what precautions to take."

Principal of Bhavan's College, Andheri, Dr V I Katchi, said, "There is no special inspection by BMC or fire brigade.
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Last year, though, we had received notices from the government and the fire brigade to submit details of our building's structure and fire safety equipment, which we did.

We have to keep fire safety equipment in labs and on every floor, and they are changed on a regular basis."

Atul Karanjkar, director-in-charge of Kohinoor International School, Kurla, said, "Fire safety in our school is composed of fire detection and firefighting procedures.

A fire detection system comprises equipments like smoke and flame detectors, that sound an alarm if there is a break out.

A firefighting system is a sprinkler system that will automatically activate and douse the fire. Then there is the fire hydrant, which is connected to water tanks. Also, there are experts whom we call who carry out the fire drills to our students and staff members."

Case Study
A MiD DAY reporter went to check a school in Mazgaon, St Mary's ICSE School, which had been inspected by the fire brigade in its drive in 2010.u00a0
It was found that on every floor, the school had green-coloured 'Exit' signs for staff and children to move out in case of calamity. They had fire extinguishers on each floor and in the water supply room.u00a0
Alice Carvalho, the school's principal, said, "Fire brigade officials did inspect our school and gave us a list of instructions that we follow. We asked them to train our staff members instead of just giving us a list of safety measures and they did. We are doing everything needed to ensure safety in the school."

Certified?
According to development control rules of the state, a government-certified engineer is supposed to visit schools once every two years. They issue a stability certificate if the building is found to be in good condition and all safety precautions are in place. In case of any breaches, the school may be refused the certificate and lose its licence to operate.

Fire in school
After a fire broke out at a school in Chennai in 2004, the Supreme Court had made it clear that every school and college has to follow certain guidelines to prevent such hazards. The fire was sparked by dry coconut leaves used as firewood in a kitchen with thatched-roof where food was being prepared for students. It is alleged that ventilation in the school building was extremely poor, with only cement-perforated windows. The kitchen fire rose so high that the two thatched roofs of the classrooms caught fire. The blazing roof, supported by bamboo poles, collapsed on students, killing most of them on the spot.