As per international rules, there should be a fire station above the population of 20,000. Distributing ration and goods will not justify the government if they have failed to initially tackle the rescue services.
Nazia Memon
Accidental fire that erupted on the night of 18th April 2022 in Faiz Mohammad Daryani Chandio village, Mehar town, Sindh is not first of its kind and it had been happening frequently due to criminal negligence of authorities.
The fire incident shook the entire nation when they came to know that it started around nine at night and continued till 8a.m next morning. No fire tenders came to help and stop the continuous spread of fire blazing the area.
This fire killed around 9 villagers including children and at least 20 people were critically injured. More than 120 houses were reduced to ashes and almost 150 cattle perished in the fire. Villagers lost their belongings, children and livestock.
All this because of the poor rescue management in Sindh.
Similar incident happened earlier this month in village Mataro Sand near Islamkot, Thar. Fire destroyed nearly 50 houses and this time too, fire brigade did not reach even after informing, despite the fact that the fire station was just 5km away from the spot.
Taking another case of 12 April 2022, fire occurred in the village Kalario, Dahli Taluka of Tharparkar engulfing 22 houses and burning valuable assets, animals and other belongings. There were no measures taken by the authorities on time due to non-availability of fire brigade.
Till now we were talking about only rural Sindh. The condition is not so different if we look up to the major cities of Sindh such as Karachi.
Karachi has been facing frequent accidental fire cases through recent years, still authorities have failed to improve the fire tender management.
There was an incident in the year 2017, where almost dozen fire tenders ran out of water while controlling the fire.
As per international rules, there should be a fire station above the population of 20,000. But if we compare it with the population of Karachi, the city is lacking too much in the numbers then. Forget about numbers, the existing fire tenders are either lacking in the basic necessity equipment or the vehicles are not available in working condition.
Amid such a big population in the city and the whole province, it is obvious that such accidental fire cases might occur anytime. The question arises here is that why the government has ignored the proper management and service of these emergency fire services?
Distributing ration and goods will not justify the government if they have failed to initially tackle the rescue services.
This is our say to the government authorities:
Listen to the call and improve the Fire rescue structure, so that these incidents do not happen in the future.
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