With yet another devastating fire claiming at least 16 lives, all the questions regarding fire safety must once again come forward. This latest fire broke out also in a chemical godown in Mirpur in the capital. The recurring fire incidents in Dhaka and also across the rest of the country have never been the acts of fate; instead, time and time again, these have been the consequences of systemic failure.
Fire incidents, sometimes devastating ones, are nothing new to us. Blazes, big or small, are taking place in the country more often than not and it is as though we have become inured to such mishaps. It is not that accidents do not happen in the developed countries in the occident. But the difference it makes is that while those countries adopt some preventive steps to stop recurrence of similar incident, in Bangladesh such sort of measures are almost unknown. We accept fire incidents with an astonishing degree of nonchalance. This stolid indifference is certainly not helpful, because if a nation ignores such disasters as something normal, preventive measures never materialise.
In 2024 alone, about 27,000 fires erupted in the country, claiming at least 140 lives-a toll driven by preventable causes-like the storage of flammable materials in densely populated buildings. The gross lack of accountability from the powerful persons is responsible for having these hazardous conditions in these buildings, and is compounded by our unplanned urbanization, where commercial and residential spaces are haphazardly mixed, and fire exits, sprinkler systems, and emergency protocols are in disarray.
What a common in all these cases is utter neglect to proper maintenance of electric gear, gas lines and other equipment which at times results in colossal mishaps and terrific human tragedy. It appears that we are callous to basic imperatives to improve the vigilance and safety network-the sine qua non for big warehouses, shopping malls, meals and factories. What we want to say unequivocally is that a large number of factories are operating across the country without a fire protection check list ignoring workplace safety and compliance issues paving the way for industrial disasters. These factories are running without installing adequate fire safety equipment in absence of stringent monitoring and inspection by the government agencies. With the rapid growth of high-tech mills and factories, high rises and shopping malls our firefighting capacity must also grow to cope with the increasing fire incidents. We have to train more firefighters and procure the latest equipment.
However, this is a cycle we must break and to do so, we must move beyond reactive firefighting to proactive fire prevention. The authorities must shut down the high-risk buildings which are stored with dangerous chemicals, and hold the owners accountable.
And the last but not the least requirement is enough water bodies and reservoirs. In our opinion, the government should enforce rigorously the safety inspection to eliminate fire accidents. Structural reform is indispensable without which the recurrence of fire mishaps are likely to happen claiming lives and property.
