Why 'structured killing' happens in disguise of fire accidents
No one has been held accountable, let alone reprimanded, for the past fire tragedies. Experts also point to the uncontrolled conversion of residential establishments into commercial buildings as a leading cause of such accidents
On the fateful 29 February evening, many checked in at the restaurants in the seven-storey Green Cozy Cottage Shopping Mall on Bailey Road. Their cosy evening soon took a turn as an accidental explosion of highly flammable gas cylinders caused a fire on the ground floor. The fire travelled fast vertically within a few minutes.
The restaurant visitors got trapped in a huge cloud of black smoke that was condensed in the only exit route. It was not actually a fire exit. And many of them, failing to escape the horror, ceased to breathe.
Again, the Bailey Road inferno reminds us that the city we live in has been transforming into a death trap because of sheer negligence by the authorities who are responsible for public safety.
Keep updated, follow The Business Standard's Google news channel
Most of the victims of the fire died due to suffocation or burns to the airways, said Brigadier General Md Asaduzzaman, director of the Dhaka Medical College Hospital (DMCH), where most of the victims—either lifeless or unconscious and injured–were brought.
Why could the restaurant visitors, even while sensing the danger, not escape? Why did the fire spread so fast?
Fire Services and Civil Defence (FSCD) high officials told journalists that the particular mall lacked fire extinguishing systems despite receiving three earlier warnings. However, independent disaster response experts and urban planners have termed the Bailey Road blaze as a 'structured killing' – similar to some other incidents that happened in the last decade and more.
"That commercial building had no fire exit. The only exit route was not fire-proof and smoke-free. Not only that, a commercial building requires an active fire system so that quick action can be taken, and passive fire protection, which may be non-active but acts as a shield against any vertical spread of fire," said a retired Brigadier General Ali Ahmed Khan, also a former Director General of FSCD.
In general, a fire may take at least 30 minutes to spread to outer walls [from where it is generated]. But what happened to the Bailey Road building was that the fire engulfed the whole building within 15-20 minutes. Because the restaurants were all decorated with flammable materials.
He first questioned the transformation of a residential establishment into a commercial building. In the same breath, he said, "Due to the loopholes in the building codes and lax monitoring by the regulatory agencies, the building owners enjoy an impunity of non-compliance. Somehow, they can escape the regulations."
We can cite some deadly fire incidents to support Ali's comment. In 2010, 124 people died in the Nimtoli Fire in Old Dhaka, 117 in the Tazreen Fashion Fire in Ashulia in 2012, 31 in the Tampaco Foils Packaging Factory Fire in Tongi in 2016, 71 in the Churihatta Fire in Chawkbazar in 2019, 26 in FR Tower Fire in Banani and 17 in Prime Plastic factory fire in Keraniganj in the same year.
Then, 54 in the Hashem Food factory fire in Narayanganj and 12 in a Moghbazar-based shop in 2021, three in the Khawaja Tower fire in Mohakhali in 2023.
According to a TBS report, no one has been held accountable, let alone reprimanded, for these fire tragedies.
Ali also raised concerns about the excessive use of flammable materials in the interior designs of commercial buildings.
He continued, "Generally, a fire may take at least 30 minutes to spread to outer walls [from where it is generated]. But what happened to the Bailey Road building was that the fire engulfed the whole building within 15-20 minutes. Because the restaurants were all decorated with flammable materials."
Ringing a fire alarm loudly, the firefighting expert warned that incidents like the Bailey Road fire would repeat frequently in the coming days. He observed that many buildings in the congested city of Dhaka lacked minimum fire protection.
In the first three months of 2023, the FSCD inspected 58 markets and shops in Dhaka and found nine to be highly risky, while 35 were risky, and the remaining 14 were moderately risky.
"Fire safety is mostly considered as a casual thing. People are reluctant to take fire safety despite observing fatal incidents regularly because of lax implementation of rules and regulations," Ali opined in frustration.
A recent TBS report said that among thousands of offices in Dhaka, not even 2% of those conduct fire training for their employees. As a result, most of them don't have an idea of how to act during a fire emergency.
Bangladesh Institute of Planners (BIP) President Adil Mohammed Khan, also a Professor at the Department of Urban and Regional Planning under Jahangirnagar University, said that the uncontrolled conversion of residential establishments into commercial buildings is increasing the risk factors of congested housing in the overpopulated Dhaka city.
Many times, BIP members raised serious concerns about such uncontrolled conversions, mostly for the mushrooming restaurants at Dhanmondi, Gulshan, Khilgaon, Uttara and other localities.
"Every fatal inferno reminds us to separate all non-compatible features from our residential zones. The idea of zoning was created globally to make residential areas safe. The irony is that Dhaka's urbanisation has completely turned back from the basic notion of urban planning," Adil said.
"Was the Bailey Road building designed [at the time of construction] as a commercial establishment? I doubt it. Because multiple commercial entities [restaurants] had only a single staircase, all the agencies related to the architectural design, interior design, approval and implementation are responsible for the fatal incident. It was a 'structured killing'," the urban planner said.
The Bailey Road building owners and similar establishments have allowed commercial entities to earn more profit from their properties as their tenants. "In such a case, the government should have taken the responsibility of ensuring public safety.
By strict law enforcement, this could have happened. Unfortunately, the non-complaints are dominating Bangladesh's policymaking," Adil expressed frustration.
