Engineers’ body serves legal notice on UT Adviser

Naina Mishra
Tribune News Service
Chandigarh, January 15

A month after students and staff of Government High School, Sector 53, had a narrow escape when bricks from an RCC beam fell off, the Council of Engineers, a Ludhiana-based non-profit organisation and an association of the Building Engineers of India, has raised a pertinent issue involving violation of the National Building Code of India under the Supreme Court directions for school buildings in Punjab and the UT.

On December 16, the school building of Government High School in Sector 53, which was constructed just six years ago, started wearing off and bricks fell from the RCC beam.

A legal notice has been sent to the UT Adviser; Chief Secretary, Punjab Civil Secretariat; Chairman, Punjab School Education Board; and Chairman, CBSE; among others. The parties have been given 15 days to file a rejoinder. In case of non-compliance, the organisation will file a civil writ petition.

In the notice, the organisation stated that Chandigarh does not allow government-certified engineers to prepare and submit building plans and getting building plans from architects only, which is in contravention of the Supreme Court orders dated April 13, 2009, in the case of “Avinash Melhotra vs. Union of India & others”, writ petition (civil) number 483 of 2004.

As per the SC orders, “the building plans for schools shall be prepared only by a government-certified engineer and the PWD Executive Engineer concerned should inspect the building and award a structural stability certificate. Stability certificates shall be issued by the state or central government engineers only and shall be mandatory for granting permission for establishing or continuation of a school.”

The SC had also observed that evaluation of the structural aspect of the school may be carried out periodically. The engineers and officials concerned were directed to strictly follow the National Building Code and issue safety certificate after proper inspection.

However, the Council of Engineers claimed in the notice that no such inspection was carried in government and private schools of Punjab and Chandigarh.

Further, the notice highlighted that “no group insurance against fire and natural calamity is being done by schools in Punjab and UT”. The SC orders directed that school buildings have to be insured against fire and natural calamities along with group insurance of students.

In Punjab’s Ludhiana district, high tension wires pass over Bharatiya Vidya Mandir, Kitchlu Nagar, and near the Kitchlu Nagar market. This is against the SC directive that no high tension power line should run inside or in proximity of schools.

Other issues raised by the organisation include no constitution of fire task force in schools, no provision of fire alarms in government schools and no provision of adequate capacity and number of fire extinguishers of ISI mark.