Faulty wiring, narrow lanes: students in Mukherjee Nagar explain why the fire tragedy was waiting to happen

Students preparing for various competitive exams in Mukherjee Nagar, a hub of coaching institutes, said Thursday’s fire incident was a tragedy waiting to happen.

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Students preparing for various competitive exams in Mukherjee Nagar, a hub of coaching institutes, said Thursday’s fire incident was a tragedy waiting to happen.

The institutes, housed in dilapidated buildings with only one entry/exit, faulty wiring and no firefighting equipment, are situated in congested lanes and often store highly combustible substances, say students.

Yash, a 25-year-old civil services aspirant, said the classrooms of coaching institutes here are packed much beyond their capacity. “If a batch strength is 100 students, the institutes admit up to 300 students. Their halls are full and there is no ventilation whatsoever,” he said.

Another UPSC aspirant, Raghav, who has been studying here for the last two years, said, “All coaching institutes here have just one entry/exit point. The stairs in the buildings are so narrow that only two people can walk beside each other at a time.”

Delhi Fire Service (DFS) chief Atul Garg said the two impediments they faced while responding to the distress call on Thursday were negotiating the congested lanes of the area and the lack of ventilation in the building that had caught fire. He also said that the building was not equipped with any fire-fighting equipment.

Abhishek Shukla, 25, said the students have often raised the issue of the lack of fire extinguishers, “but nobody pays attention when we complain.”