Hospital fire consumes 90 in Kolkata

Most of those who died were ICCU, ICU patients; owners held; licence revoked

The deaths caused a violent backlash against the owners of AMRI Hospitals — a Shrachi-Emami joint venture run by the house of one of Kolkata’s wealthiest businessmen, the Todis — with relatives of those who perished and local residents venting their fury and destroying hospital property in the congested and thickly populated residential locality of Dhakuria in south Kolkata.

AMRI Hospitals is jointly promoted by the RS Goenka-led Emami Group and the S K Todi-led Shrachi Group of companies. Of the 90 who died, three were hospital staff.

The Trinamool Congress-led West Bengal government acted swiftly to cancel the registration of AMRI Hospitals, which operates another large unit in Salt Lake. In line with the government’s action, Kolkata Police arrested the owners, S K Todi and Ravi Todi, Ravi Goenka, Manish Goenka, Prasanta Goenka and Day­ananda Agarwal on different charges against them.

This is the second major deadly fire incident in Kolkata. In March 2010, Stephen Court, an old, expansive residential building in up-market Park Street was burnt allegedly because of an electrical short circuit, killing 43 people. On Friday, as an angry Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee mo­ved into action in her inimi­table style and Calcuttans exp­ressed their outrage at the inc­ident, the Todis and the Go­­enkas surrendered before Kolkata Police authorities in the evening just before being arrested. The six have been charged wi­th “negligence, culpable ho­micide not amounting to murd­er and attempt to culpable ho­m­icide,” a senior police officer said.

Most of the 160 patients, admitted in the ICCU, ICU, the intensive therapy and the critical care units, the orthopaedic department died in their sleep.

According to fire brigade officers, the fire broke out around 3:30 am in the hospital buildi­ng’s basement which was me­ant for parking vehicles but was used as a storehouse.
“The storehouse was full of combustible elements, so the fire spread rapidly. When local reisdents from nearby houses and highrise buildings noticed the flames and the smoke and rushed to rescue the patients they were allegedly chased away by the security guards,” West Bengal Urban Development Minister Firhad Hakim, who was at the spot, said.

What caused the relatives and the local residents to resort to violence was the alleged apathetical attitude of the hospital staff who abandoned the pati­ents to die or fend for themselves.

State government officials made no bones to disclose that the staff at the hospital esc­aped and carried out with th­em hospital documents and whatever money was there in the cash-box.  “But not one of them did anything to help the dying patients,” Sayantan Sengupta, a local resident, who chipped in with the rescue operations, said. The hospital authorities, however, claimed that some of the patients were evacuated, though this is not corroborated by either the fire brigade or the state government.

Asphyxiation
It was not the fire that killed the patients and others but the thick black smoke that engulfed five floors of the the centrally air-conditioned hospital that caused asphyxiation and death.

Since Dhakuria is a congested locality with narrow ro­ads, it proved difficult to take the fire tenders as close as possible to the hospital. Most of the fire tenders sprayed water on to the building from the adjoining flyover which is barely a few metres from the hospital.

Hundreds of people watched the rescue operation from the nearby flyover and highrise buildings. With narrow and winding la­nes proving a hind­rance in rescue operations, firemen had a tough time entering the smoke-logged building.

Some of the patients and those trapped inside screamed for help, but none came as it became near-impossible to penetrate the thick, black smoke billowing out of the windows and doorways of the multi-storeyed building.

“At 4:10 am when we got the information we responded immediately but due to these physical and circumstantial problems it took a lot of time before we could reach out to the helpless patients” Additional Director-General, Fire Services, D Biswas said.

  The ADG also added that 250 firemen and 25 fire engines battled for nearly seven hours before the fire could be controlled, though not completely extinguished.

When the firemen could finally get their act together, they pressed into service pulleys from the upper floors and other rudimentary methods to rescue some of the unconscious and dazed patients clutching their mouths and necks affected by the poisonous smoke.
Biswas also said those rescued could not be brought down by ladders put all around the building complex since they were in no physical condition to withstand the pressure. There were little or no fire safety measures in the hospital which otherwise charges huge amounts from patients. Fire Services Minister Javed Khan said the fire spread because of stocks of highly combustible material.

Besides, he said, the hospital did not have proper fire-fighting equipment. AMRI Hospitals’ senior vice president S Upadhay said the hospital followed “strict fire safety measures and conducted regular fire drills”.

Announcing a compensation of Rs 5 lakh each for the relatives of those who died and free medical treatment for the injured, Upadhay claimed: “All statutory safety and fire licenses are in place.”   But this was not enough to appease West Bengal Chief Minister Banerjee who ordered an enquiry, directing the concerned Health Department to cancel the hospital’s licence, which was immediately complied with.

Mamata Banerjee, who rushed to the spot immediately to take a stock of the rescue operation, promised Rs 3 lakh each to the victims’ not-so-well-off family members. “If anybody appeals for a government job we will also try to help them out,” Banerjee said.