Govt sleeps over upgrading facilities at fire deptt

JAIPUR: The recent instances of fire outbreaks in residential and commercial complexes point at the state government's inability to strengthen the city's fire department.
According to Census 2011, the city population stands at 66, 63,971, with the number of people staying in residential apartments on a continuous rise. The government however, does not seem to be in a mood to upgrade the facilities at the fire department.
Over the past two decades, the government has not taken any fresh recruits in the department.When contacted, chief fire officer, Ishwarlal Jat told TOI, "No recruitments have been made since long. At seven stations, we are facing a severe staff crunch."
The fire department has only 65 permanent fire officers and 20 permanent drivers. It has around 92 firemen and 24 drivers on contract. Sources in the department said the firefighters on contract do not have the required expertise to deal with emergency conditions. "The existing staff is only 10 % of the required strength and the department needs around 800 more employees," Jat said
According to a government rule, the fire department should have one fire tender for a population of one lakh, and beyond that for every 50,000 people there should be one fire tender.
"Currently, the department has around 40 fire tenders, but is short of another 40 vehicles," Jat said. He claimed, "The work order for 20 high pressure fire tenders has been released and will be procured soon by the department. The department is ready to procure a snorkel ladder which can give fire fighters access to buildings up to a height of 42 metre," the chief fire officer said.
An eyewitness to the fire that broke out at the Royal Ensign apartment on Saturday, Nadan Nadgar, secretary of the apartment said, "The fire fighters did not use their water to extinguish the fire." To this Jat however reasoned, "The capacity of some fire brigades is less and due to throwing water with high pressure, the tank gets empty within two minutes. I suppose, as the fire was massive, the fire fighters had to use the residential water."
Box
The department has 40 fire tenders
15 fire tenders have water capacity of 2000 litre
6 fire tenders have water capacity of 12000 l
18 fire tenders have water capacity of 4000 l