Relieve fire brigade of bird rescue, tree fall and oil spill calls, suggests probe report

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The report was submitted to Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis and Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC) Commissioner Ajoy Mehta on Tuesday.

Apart from bird and animal rescue calls, the panel has recommended that calls related to fallen trees and oil spillage on city roads should be diverted too. “Traffic congestion caused by fallen trees should be handled by the traffic police and the respective ward offices.

Similarly, the fire brigade should not be called for oil spillage, which can be inspected by the traffic police,” the report says.

A member of the panel said they arrived at this decision due to unfortunate incidents in the past when firemen lost their lives while trying to rescue animals. “The brigade is a uniformed service specialised in managing disasters. They are short-staffed and already burdened with a huge number of calls,” said the senior official.

He added that even coastal security should be removed from the brigade’s purview and the responsibility should be handed over to the Mumbai Police.

On an average, senior fire officials estimate, over 50 calls related to bird and animal rescue are received every day in the city. Around 18,000 such calls are received annually. In December 2013, after the fire brigade received a bird rescue call from Masjid Bunder, 31-year-old fireman Umesh Parvate climbed 20 feet up a roof to free a crow, slipped and fell to his death.

Dr Sanjay Mukherjee, Additional Municipal Commissioner who chaired the panel, said, “We have studied various aspects of the brigade and have come up with a report that sticks to the terms of reference. We have mainly spoken about measures to make the brigade more disciplined, and focused. We want all the non-fire-related tasks to be removed from the brigade’s profile.”

A fire official, in-charge of the control room in Byculla, said most of the time firemen, on receiving such calls would ask people in the neighbourhood to help rescue the birds and animals. “Instead of sending a separate team of four firemen with one fire engine, we request the people to try and rescue the bird. Most of the time, they even call back and tell us that the rescue has been done. This is a better option because we will struggle if there is a major fire incident in the same area at that time,” the official said.

The 1,686-strong force is facing a shortage of manpower in carrying out its functions and 58 posts are vacant. The Kalbadevi incident that left four senior fire officials, including the chief fire officer, dead has also shaken the morale of the brigade.

The panel has also addressed the fire brigade’s long-pending demand for a separate administrative unit to grant no-objection certificates (NOC) to buildings in the city. An NOC is given after an inspection of the internal fire-fighting equipment of the building. The panel has said that fire officials have to do an inspection before and after granting the NOC, which affects their main duty of firefighting.

A fire act cell comprising 99 officials to handle the administrative job was mooted two years ago, but is yet to be implemented by the civic body.

A senior civic official said, “The brigade’s key job is firefighting. We have recommended that the administration be handed over to other departments. We have said there should be a revision in managerial system and it has to be completely digitized to save time.” The panel comprised Mahesh Narvekar, Chief of Disaster Management; L S Vhatkar, Director, Engineering Services and Projects; P S Rahangdale, Acting Chief Fire Officer; Narendra Barde, Deputy Municipal Commissioner; Santosh Warick, Director, Maharashtra Fire Services; Ambarishkumar Gupta, Chief Engineer, Mechanical and Engineering. Additional Municipal Commissioner Sanjay Deshmukh, a permanent invitee on the panel, has been appointed to implement the recommendations.