Saved: 120 children

The incident points to several lessons not learnt. The PMC school board had issued a circular following the Kumbakonam tragedy that canteens need to operate at a safe distance from classrooms. Here, the kitchen was in the ground floor.

And no one can throw any light on this discrepancy. Neither owner Sachin Naryanpure, who claims the mess existed for well over a decade, until he took over eight months ago. Or the teachers of PMC schools, who were supposedly treated to a course in fire-fighting.

Bearer Balaji Pawar, who was trying to heat water for a bath, got away with a burnt foot. But the ingredients for another Kumbakonam tragedy were there — four gas cylinders — said fire brigade officials.

The kitchen only points to a part of the criminal neglect by the PMC. The rickety stairs leading to the school can collapse any moment. Here, 120 children from Balwadi are cramped into four rooms, as the other rooms have leaky roofs. And there are no benches, only moth-eaten durries. The basement has been water-logged since the second week of August.

To cap it all, the school doesn’t even have a principal. It’s unlikely it will ever get one — because a mere 120 children don’t merit one, or so you are informed by senior teacher Vaibhavi Tambole, who runs the school along with two teachers and two sevikas.

Ask her whether the school has any fire-fighting equipment and you’re clearly trying her patience. But for the 120 children, who went to class routinely around Wednesday noon, no one would ever know what saved the day.