KARACHI, Sept 21: The Defence Housing Authority and the fire brigade department of the city government have developed row over the ownership of a fire station, located at Submarine Chowrangi in Clifton.
The DHA claims that it had established a fire station near the Submarine Chowrangi, which was operational round-the-clock. However, the city government’s fire department claimed that the plot was allotted to the fire department in 1973, which had allegedly been occupied by the Clifton Cantonment Board.
The Karachi Development Authority’s land and estate department issued a letter on Aug 31, 1973 addressing to the Chief Fire Officer which reads: “… the [Sindh] Minister HTP&LG, has been pleased to allot you a site No.ST9/9 in Scheme No-V (Clifton) measuring about one acre free of charge for establishment of fire station. This concession would not apply for any other amenity or public building site and this land must be used exclusively for establishment of fire fighting station.”
Chief Fire Officer Kazim Ali said that the fire department had written many letters to the cantonment board to vacate the plot and hand it over to the fire department so that a full-fledged fire station could be established there. However, no efforts were made in this respect.
He reiterated that there was not a single fire station in the limits of Defence Housing Authority. About the fire station at Submarine Chowrangi, he claimed that the land fell under the jurisdiction of the city government and not in the jurisdiction of the DHA. A full-fledge fire station could not be established with two fire tenders parked there. He elaborated that a standard operating procedure (SOP) should be followed, according to which the fire tenders have to leave the station within one minute after the receipt of a fire complaint. The distribution of staff on each fire tender was also done under the SOP, but there was no SOP in the fire station at Submarine Chowrangi, he said.
However, the DHA had claimed that a fully operational fire station, established at the Submarine Chowrangi, was working under arrangements of the DHA to respond to any untoward/ emergent situation arising out of any fire incident in the localities of DHA and Clifton cantonment. An additional fire tender of the DHA, near Marina Club in Phase-VIII is also available.
The DHA claimed that its vigilance team had got the news of fire at Village Restaurant at 0210 hours and at 0225 hours the fire tender of DHA was first to reach the site.
The Executive Director of the Village Restaurant, Shakil Ahmed, disputed the DHA claim saying that the fire information was passed on to many agencies including police on 15. “I noticed the fire tender of the DHA at the site at around 4am,” he recalled.
CFO Kazim Ali said that the fire tenders from central fire station to Village Restaurant took about 25 minutes to reach the site. If the fire tenders had reached the restaurant earlier, the fire could be controlled immediately and a lot of furniture and wooden works could have been saved.
MPA Akhtar Bilgrami, resident of Badar Commercial and elected in the constituency of the Defence, said: “The DHA has allowed building a number of clubs but there is no fire station in the area besides many other basic facilities”.
He said that the issue about owning the land of fire station was brought to his notice and he would review the matter. “If the land belongs to fire brigade department, I will strongly recommend it to be handed over to the fire department so that a full-fledged fire station could be built over there,” he added.
Criticizing the working of the DHA, he said that the Authority had been indulging in the affairs of government. In this regard, he referred to a vigilance team, established by the DHA, to lift the vehicles from no-parking zones though it was the duty of traffic police and not the DHA. He said the vehicles were not only lifted but DHA team also imposed fines on drivers.