PGIMER tears down illegal wall to prevent incidents of fire

After taking note of an incident in Chandigarh’s Phase 2 Industrial Area where a massive fire swept through an electronics goods firm, killing two 18-year-old female workers and injuring three others, management at the Post Graduate Institute of Medical Education and Research (PGIMER) decided to break down an illegally raised brick wall within its HDF Unit, the Advanced Paediatric Centre (APC) to avoid similar untoward incidents.
A High Dependency facility is situated within the APC and its head—Dr Arun Baranwal—was reportedly sent several notices to dismantle the brick wall. The wall was reportedly constructed byBaranwal two years ago. Not only is this wall illegal, but it also blocks the fire exit door. Two minor fire incidents have already occurred due to this wall—the fires were put out in a timely manner by APC Hospital management.
HDF Head Dr Arun Baranwal has raised this wall without any prior permission from the different departments. A fact-finding committee chaired by Prof BR Mittal, Head, Department of Nuclear Medicine, to ascertain the facts and assign responsibility for the lapse stated, “blocking the corridor of the Fire Exit in HDF Unit, 4th C. APC found that the HDF Head Dr Baranwal made ‘illegal’ structural changes in the HDF architectural plans without any approvals and after the final plans were approved and frozen by various engineering and administrative departments, closed the corridor with a brick wall, converting the toilet/bathing area into a store, installing aluminium glazing in front, closing the opening towards the store, moving the nursing counter, converting the shoe rack area into a scrub station…independently vetted the revised unapproved architectural floor plan.”
On Tuesday, PGIMER Director Dr Vivek Lal told The Daily Guardian, “We are going to break that wall without any further delay”. Dr Baranwal made the above-mentioned changes by providing false information to the contractor, M/S Bansal, and withheld this information from HE Civil II Fire Officers, as well as Architecture, and Biomedical officers. Notably, Baranwal was the Chairman of the APC Fire Safety Committee at the time. Moreover, the fire officer requested Dr Baranwal vide letters dated 27.08.21 and 07.01.22 to remove the wall that is blocking the corridor because it could lead to a serious untoward fire incident, but Dr Baranwal did not respond or take any action.
On Monday, a factory in Chandigarh’s Industrial Area caught fire. According to Fire Department officials, the blaze was a tragedy waiting to happen as the department had last Saturday found several shortcomings on the premises. The inspection revealed that the owners did not possess a fire safety certificate for operating the electrical firm from the building. Fire officials also found several loose-hanging wires and several other violations. Regarding the electric firm case additional commissioner of Chandigarh civic body, Gurinder Sodhi, who is also the Chief Fire Officer of Chandigarh, told The Daily Guardian, “The owners didn’t have any fire safety certificate. Our officials, during a routine fire safety inspection, found several discrepancies on Saturday. We were to serve them a notice today for not complying with fire safety norms.” Sodhi said that the fire tenders reached the spot minutes after the blaze first was reported. “Our fire tenders had reached the spot within minutes. The fire was contained within half an hour. The two women died of suffocation. Our firemen rescued them and rushed them to a hospital immediately, but they couldn’t be saved. The condition of the other rescued girls is stable,” Sodhi added.