Fire in canteen of Bombay House,3 dead

Canteen workers Farad Dinshaw Wadia (26),Shrushank Chandrakant Pawar (32) and Eashwar Patel (47) died of asphyxiation,said Dr C G Gaikwad,Supritendent of St George Hospital. Another man,Chandrakant More,was rescued,but is in a critical condition in the hospital. Four others were also injured.

Parts of the basement of the colonial four-storey structure built in 1924 were damaged in the fire,said officials. According to the Fire Department’s officers,a ‘total flooding system’,a fire-fighting system meant or enclosed spaces like basements,was in place,but had been put on the ‘manual mode’ owing to which it did not kick in automatically even after the smoke detectors sounded an alarm. In such a system,stored inert gases are released when smoke is detected,cutting off oxygen to the fire and thereby halting its spread for the next three to four minutes,said fire officials. Here,the gases did not release even after the staff tried to switch the system on.

Chief Fire Officer Uday Tatkare said companies often put such a system on manual mode since the gases release even at the slightest detection of smoke. “If this system had been active,the trapped people may have got some crucial minutes before the fumes became thick and eventually choked them,” said Tatkare.

The fire originated in the office,possibly due to a spark in the airconditioning system,and the thick fumes spread to all parts of the basement. The deceased were found lying unconscious in the kitchen. A fire official said though the kitchen had two doors,one was always kept locked.

Deputy Commissioner of Police (Zone I) Cherring Dorje said they have registered a case of accidental death,but are investigating all possible angles. “It is clear that the three were looking for an exit but because of the darkness and smoke they were unable to locate the door. They were somehow pushed to the windows where they were asphyxiated. If we find something suspicious in the Fire Department report,we will register a case accordingly,” said Dorje. The Azad Maidan police officers investigating the fire are not ruling out ‘mischief’ or ‘sabotage’ leading to the blaze,he added.

Mumbai Heritage Conservation Committee chairman Dinesh Afazlpurkar said four months back the panel had written to then Municipal Commissioner Swadheen Kshatriya regarding the need to monitor the use of basements in some heritage structures. “We have earlier suggested to the civic administration that a routine check on such structures should be done by the local ward authorities. In our surveys and visits and through various complaints,we have found that there are a number of places in South Mumbai where there are violations and the basements are being used for purposes which are not in line with safety guidleines.”