The performance of the Sindh Building Control Authority (SBCA) is once again on the radar after a massive fire destroyed or damaged many shops in Karachi’s Saddar Cooperative Market on Sunday.
Emerging details show the market had no fire alarm and water sprinkler system. The basement of the market, which was meant to be for parking, was being used as warehouse and shops by the builder of the market. Additional floors were also being constructed at the market.
The fire laws of buildings are provided under the SBCA's Karachi Building and Town Planning Regulations (KBTR) 2002. The fire department of the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation (KMC) has to certify the building’s fire safety precautions and the civil defence department is supposed to conduct inspections regularly. None of these departments, however, seem to be abiding by their own bylaws or even coordinating with each other, leaving the citizens out on a limb.
The SBCA bylaws clearly mention that all the buildings that are ground-plus-three storeys or above, or more than 43-foot high, should be provided a set of standpipes system that should be installed in a vertical position to which fire hoses can be connected, allowing manual application of water to the fire.
SBCA spokesperson Faran Qaiser said the cooperative market was constructed in 1960s, and the SBCA came into being after 1979, while the KBRT regulations were formulated in 1982. “The market was preoccupied. It was the responsibility of the occupants to check the fire alarm and water sprinkler system,” he said, adding that the fire department should have also inspected the market.
After the cooling process at the building, he said, the SBCA’s dangerous building committee would inspect the market and check if it should be declared hazardous or not. Meanwhile, the Karachi Metropolitan Corporation’s (KMC) chief fire officer said that it was the responsibility of the SBCA to check if the market had a fire alarm system or not.
More than 800 shops at the Saddar Cooperative Market are said to have been affected by the inferno. According to traders of the market, their businesses have been reduced to ashes. They say 90 per cent of the market and warehouses had been destroyed and a loss worth Rs5-10 billion incurred. On Monday, several politicians and government officials visited the market, which is famous for bridal dresses among other shops. The traders shared that not only cloth but a lot of cash had been burned to ashes.
The shopkeepers lamented that the fire brigade took time to reach the scene. The Jamaat-e-Islami’s Hafiz Naeem, during a visit to the market, said the entire market was ash now and the traders were on roads. He demanded of the government to carry out a rapid survey and compensate them.
He also demanded probing into the fire and forming an inquiry commission. “This is not a small incident. It’s a huge market,” he said, adding that municipal organisations once again failed and the fire brigade couldn’t reach on time. He said the fire brigade didn’t have foam, “not even water”.
The president of the Cooperative Market Association announced a blockade of Abdullah Haroon Road until the government compensated them. He demanded that the government announce a tax amnesty and relaxation from all sorts of bills, including that of the K-Electric.
“We are not in a position to even submit these bills in next six months,” he stressed, adding that Karachi Commissioner Iqbal Memon claimed that only 30 to 35 shops had been burned. He asked the commissioner to see the damage himself.
Another member of the association pointed out that 800 to 900 shops had burned down in the horrific fire. “This was our bread and butter,” he said, requesting the federal and provincial government to carry out an immediate survey of the market and compensate them.
Another trader shared how Administrator Karachi Metropolitan Corporation Murtaza Wahab visited the market on Sunday night and assured them that they would stay with them but didn’t show up 24 hours after the fire broke up. “No government official showed up at the market.”
A trader of readymade garments said there wasn’t any chemical or foam with the fire brigade to extinguish the blaze. He said they give the highest amount of tax in the country but their city’s fire tenders are devoid of chemicals to put off fires. “We were seeing our ancestral businesses burning in front of our eyes and we could not do anything about this,” he said.
The trader said that in at least 600 shops were there 6,000 workers, and 600 to 800 of them were owners and he rest of them were daily-wagers. “When we went inside everything
was ash.”
Commissioner Iqbal Memon and personnel of various law enforcement agencies had visited the site to monitor the firefighting operation on Sunday night. He said the inferno had been declared a "third-degree fire". He had said there are around 300-400 shops in the market, of which “35 had been completely gutted”. When asked about the cause of the fire, he said it would be premature to comment on the matter at this point.
KMC Administrator Murtaza Wahab said that if there was a fire safety system in every office or shop, institutions would not have been blamed. Speaking on the fire that erupted in the Cooperative Market in Saddar, he said the same administration worked hard to extinguish the fire.
