Fire safety not a priority of most private schools

Ravinder Sood

Palampur, May 25

Most private schools in the region need to ensure that they have proper fire safety arrangements in their institutions.

Though the state government last year announced to withdraw no-objection certificates (NOCs) from schools identified by it as vulnerable to fires, no steps have been taken either to streamline the system, or cancel the NOCs issued to the schools.

A senior officer of the Education Department said it was a serious matter. Despite the repeated letters, most private institutions failed to follow the guidelines and lacked fire safety devices. These schools were reportedly doing nothing to plug the loopholes.

During a visit to schools by a Tribune team today, it was seen that 90 per cent schools had only one staircase, though these had a strength of more than 1,000 students. Besides, most of the school also had no emergency exit.

According to fire safety rules, staircases in schools must be a minimum of eight-metre wide with an emergency exit also. But in many schools, these were only three-foot wide.

Most owners of the schools were unaware of the fire safety norms. They said they had not received any guidelines from the state government so far.

Some schools are located in narrow lanes. These schools also need to be more cautious about their fire-safety arrangements, because one cannot rule out a stampede in case of a fire.