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Fire Safety in Schools

Background

All of us were shocked and saddened by the death of more than 90 school children in Kumbakonam, Tamil Nadu on July 16th, 2004. Such images of abject grief, of victims, of largely avoidable man-made disasters, occur repeatedly in India and are soon forgotten till the next incident jolts public memory again. The tragedy in Tamil Nadu occurred mainly due to the unsafe structure of the school, blocking off the only escape route of the children and due to “instructions” by the teachers to the students not to move from their places, whereas their response should have been to evacuate the children immediately and avoid the tragedy.

It is a distressing fact that most schools in our country are built with minimum concern for safety and teachers are not trained on basic life saving procedures to be followed in case of emergencies.

While the Tamil Nadu tragedy is still poignant in our minds, there is an urgent need to appraise the safety of our schools in Bangalore. We are initiating a dialogue with all concerned organizations, Government departments, Educational Institutions, Public and students to try and enumerate the essentials of handling emergencies is greatly needed.

Some of the issues we are trying to raise are:

ESG is an independent not-for-profit organisation that promotes the cause of environmental and social justice through research, documentation, advocacy, training and campaign support. We aim to support the rights of local communities and voiceless ecosystems in a responsible, progressive manner that keeps contextual complexities in mind.