AP Govt nod awaited for fire station at HC, Secretariat

Express News Service
Hyderabad, March 26: PICTURE this. Fire breaks out in two major nerve centres of the State administration _ AP High Court and Secretariat _ which house more than a dozen multi-storeyed buildings in the city and people run helter-skelter for safety due to delay in the arrival of fire tenders.
These two complexes are visited by thousands of people. In fact, there is a newly-built helipad near the Secretariat but neither has fire stations to tackle a fire emergency.
Keeping this in view, the High Court registrar general requested the director general of Fire Services (DGFS) in May last year to open a full-fledged fire station in the court's vicinity and till that time, position one or two fire engines round the clock for safe-guarding valuable records and buildings from fire hazard.
Concurring with the court official's view, the DGFS, in a letter to the State Government around the same time, said the nearest fire station at Gowliguda was 3 km away and another at Moghalpura, 4 km away.
The letter said: ``In view of the heavy traffic, the fire engines may not be able to respond immediately in case of emergency at the High Court and therefore there is an immediate need for the establishment of a fire station
there as requested by the registrar general.''
Expressing his inability to station fire tenders near the court, the DGFS wrote that after 1983 no new fire station was opened in the twin cities and the existing ones were `quite inadequate' to meet emergencies.
He urged the State Government to sanction a fire station at the High Court with a double unit with one assistant district fire officer and station fire officer, four leading firemen, five driver operators and 20 firemen at a cost of about Rs 1.22 cr, including Rs 87.85 lakh non-recurring expenditure and Rs 34.55 lakh recurring expenditure.
No budgetary allocation had been made during 2006-07 and he wanted the State Government to release funds.
For the Secretariat, the city police requested the DGFS in November 2005 to provide fire-fighting arrangements as per norms at the helipad which is used by Chief Minister YS Rajasekhara Reddy for landing and take-off.
Here too, the DGFS sought sanction of a new fire station with the same staff pattern as proposed at the High Court. The cost would be Rs 1.03 cr, including Rs 73.25 lakh non-recurring expenditure and the rest recurring.
The State Government, however, had not yet acted, Fire Service officials told City Express.