Al-Karim Watch Market -- a three-storey, rather small commercial building and one of the dozen other in the ever so busy New Anarkali Bazaar -- has been temporarily sealed by the police after the December 29 fire that took 13 lives.
More than 25 years old, the plaza, now cordoned off with a tent and crime-scene safety tape, boasts over 20 watch shops, a basement and a third floor that is used for storage purposes. The ground floor of the market is completely gutted, while the first floor is partially damaged.
The fire started at the only entrance of the market at around 5pm, apparently due to the short-circuiting of electricity supply lines that were loosely hanging at its front.
The plaza had no fire extinguishers, windows or emergency exits.
"The fire erupted at the gate and within minutes it leapt up on the entrance of the building, completely engulfing it," recalls Zeeshan, who has a shop right across the street.
"I saw a man trying to jump out but he was held back by somebody screaming for help. He turned back and could not reach the gate again."
Incidentally, the entrance to the building was also the only exit.
"Most of the shop owners at that time were off to say Maghrib prayers when the incident happened; otherwise the death toll would’ve risen," says Muhammad Akram, a shop owner who lost a worker to the fire that unfortunate day. Besides, his business loss totals Rs5 million (approx.).
"We didn’t know what had happened but the police started blaming the fire on a UPS battery burst," he adds.
Surprisingly, Akram was taken in police custody for two days, upon the assumption that the battery was lying in his shop. But later when the police found out that there was no such battery in his shop, they let him out.
According to Akram, "the union president of the market traders, who also lost a son in the incident, had repeatedly asked the plaza owner. He had lodged a complaint with the concerned officials to properly cover the electricity supply lines but nobody paid attention."
Akram, who has to make visits to China occasionally for business purposes, says that (in China) "every big commercial building and plazas have no less than 10 exits. But here, the plaza owners and the district administration are completely silent on such issues."
He urges the Punjab chief minister to take strict action against the plaza owner and the concerned government authorities for approving the construction of such a building.
"There was space for stairs and an exit to the third floor but the owner made a shop there and sold it," says another trader Suhail Ahmed, who had three shops and claims a loss of around Rs50 million.
Basements which, in papers, are meant for parking, have been converted into shops in many markets in the bazaar. "Government authorities are bribed to stay mum," says Mian Zahid, another local trader, demanding the CM to not be lenient on this issue at all.
The Rescue 1122 Fire Service in its initial inquiry report indicates fire due to a possible chain reaction in a stockpile of battery cells after short circuiting. The 13 victims were trapped on the ground and the first floors because of a single opening to the plaza as access to rooftop was blocked by constructing another shop. Three shops were completely gutted.
It took rescue vehicles eight minutes to reach the accident spot from their local station which is at only one-kilometer distance but shockingly they took more than 30 minutes to fully start the operation on not less than 80-feet wide road.
The fire has brought to the fore some very important security issues in the city which the administration seems to have overlooked. The reason why the firefighters lost so much time was because two-thirds of the 80ft road was heavily encroached upon with parked motorbikes and front stalls of the shops.
"It was very difficult to make space for fire brigade on this wide a road just because of encroachment," a rescue official says. "Many lives could have been saved if the road was clear and the building had more than one exit in the plaza."
Most of the people died of suffocation. A 13-year-old died of burns.
Azhar Siddique advocate, representing Judicial Activism Panel, has filed a petition in the Lahore High Court for fixing responsibilities of persons and departments concerned for the negligence.
In the largest province of Punjab, many people lost their lives and businesses while a large number of buildings are without fire safety systems. Encroachments, illegal building structures, encroachments on roads and in front of commercial buildings in congested areas, traffic jams, no fire extinguishing facilities, no rescue arrangements and no safe exits, are considered main reasons behind fire breakouts and the tragedies resulting from them in the city. Lahore Development Authority has never been taken to task, locals say.
In September 2012, at least 25 workers died when fire erupted inside a shoe factory in Lahore’s congested residential area. Fire crews succeeded in controlling the blaze after several hours. The factory, which was located at Bund Road, caught fire from its electricity generator.
In 2011, four fire fighters fell unconscious while goods and valuables worth over millions of rupees were reduced to ashes when huge fire erupted inside a multi-storey plaza in the congested locality of Shah Alam Market. The fire, due to short circuit, quickly engulfed four shops and destroyed plastic toys and other material worth millions of rupees. Three people died while five went missing in the tragedy.
In December 2008, fire erupted in the basement of a multi-storey plaza in Bara in Shah Alam Market and turned its many-storey building into ashes.
According to the Rescue 1122 official reports, 60,000 fire incidents have been responded to, since 2007. While the estimated property and business losses in these incidents are more than Rs170 billion.
Major reasons that led to the catastrophe