VIJAYAWADA: Despite it being mandatory to keep firefighting equipment ready at every Ganesh pandals, the ground reality showed a different picture. Several pandals in the city were seen neglecting the fire safety rules, asked to be followed strictly by the city police commissioner Ch Dwaraka Tirumala Rao.
From the equipment being expensive to having faith in the elephant God were cited as reasons by the organisers for not following the norms.
“Fire extinguishers are not easily available and also are quite expensive. There is no point in investing money just to keep it for three or five days. Bringing sand from the river bed is easier but it takes time and buying it is also of little use,” said Satyam Reddy, the organiser of a pandal at Guru Nanak Colony. Another organiser, in One Town, said there was no need of owning the equipment as the fire officials could be called if necessary. “We have taken all measures to avoid any fire accident. The electricity line is proper, the lights are of high voltage and good quality. In case if anything happens still, we can give a call to firefighters anytime,” he said.
Commenting on the situation, the fire officials said they had appealed to all the organisers to keep all the equipment in place. “We conducted provisional inspection and asked all the pandals to keep with them fire extinguishers and sand. Only after they agreed to do so, we gave them the no objection certificates (NOCs). But, since the rules are not being followed we will re-inspect the pandals and insist that they keep the necessary materials,” Station Fire Officer V Subba Rao said.
He added that if even after warning, the organisers refused to follow the rules, appropriate actions would be taken against them as per the advice of the municipal commissioner.Meanwhile, citing the fire incident that took place on Wednesday morning in one of the pandals in the neighbouring Telangana state, Krishna district Fire Officer Avinash Jaysimha urged the organisers to take necessary measures to prevent such a mishap from occurring in their pandals.