Ahmedabad: One of 21 LPG cylinders stacked together exploded inside a four-storeyed building in the Kalupur area of Ahmedabad. The fire was deemed out after firefighters spent four hours battling it. Fire broke out less than one kilometer from the route of the city’s Heritage Walk.
Firefighters struggled to bring the blaze at the jewellery engraving unit under control due to lack of space to bring a big fire-fighting vehicle inside the narrow lane. The firefighters wasted precious 15 minutes carrying hoses between the mini-fighter parked near the burning building and big tankers that had to be placed 700 metres away on the main road, dealing with loss of water pressure and waste of precious minutes.
The incident brings up the larger issue of fire safety in the walled city area, which is made up of heritage structures and residences constructed of wood and stone. They are set so close together that a large enough fire could possibly destroy multiple buildings, said fire officials.
In-charge Chief Fire Officer Rajesh Bhatt said there’s an urgent need to install fire safety measures across the walled city.
However, four years after UNESCO awarded the tag of World Heritage City to Ahmedabad on July 8, 2017, the first city in India to be so recognised, fire safety in the old city seems to have remained a low priority for AMC.
On the flip side, the identification and labelling of heritage home stays for tourism was carried out in 2019-2020.
Back in 2018, AMC had come up with a plan to lay water pipelines and install fire hydrants at strategic points in various Pols.
This would enable the firefighters to halt their vehicles and tankers at the nearest possible access route and affix their motors and pipes to the system. They would then carry additional fire hoses into the narrow lanes and access the hydrant nearest to the site of
the fire.
However, after laying about 200-220 metres of the pipeline in Dhal Ni Pol as part of the pilot project back in 2018, the project was set aside.
Mirror has now learnt that a meeting of senior officials of the Heritage Cell, the Fire Department and Ahmedabad World Heritage City Trust (AWHCT) held recently has proposed to lay another 500 metres of pipeline along the Heritage Walk route from the Kalupur Swaminarayan Temple to Relief Road. It will have five access points for hydrants, one every 100 metres.
The estimate of the new work proposal is about Rs 1.2 crore and will include fire safety of about 3-4 pols situated on the Heritage Walk in the first phase, apart from pending electrical and infrastructure development. It will be put before the Municipal Commissioner this week, said sources in the civic body.
Ashish Trambadia, CEO of the Ahmedabad World’s Heritage City Trust (AWHCT) was unavailable for comment in spite of repeated attempts to reach him.
