By Pawan Tripathi

Gautam Buddha Nagar (UP), Dec 4 (IANS): Incidents of a fire breaking out have been increasing continuously and the fire department has been taking steps to prevent this.

Uttar Pradesh's Gautam Buddha Nagar has an abundance of open market shops along with high-rise buildings, schools, malls, bars and industrial areas. Even a small spark in any building of the area can lead to a major fire.

The fire department prepared a list of all those people who either do not have a No Objection Certificate (NOC) or have a shortage of fire fighting equipment in their premises.

After this initiative, people have been actively engaged in fixing all shortcomings related to fire safety.

According to data from last year, 550 people in Gautam Buddha Nagar lacked fire fighting arrangements in their shops, restaurants, malls, bars, schools, etc., or did not have Fire NOC issued by the fire department of the state.

Along with this, notices have been issued to about 300 high-rise societies.

Out of these 300 societies, 250 have sent back reports of proper fire fighting arrangements in their premises to the department.

The Chief Fire Officer (CFO) of Gautam Buddha Nagar, Pradeep Kumar, in a conversation with IANS termed the area as a sensitive district. He said that stations had been set up at different places to make arrangements regarding fire safety.

He added that there was no scope for negligence as the district is the "show window" of UP.

He said that notices had been sent to more than 800 people to get the fire NOC and address the related inadequacies and the people have been doing it.

Kumar said that public awareness campaigns would be organised in schools, marketplaces malls and public spaces in Noida and Greater Noida to enable the people to protect themselves in such cases and to prepare them to be alert.

He added that his team conducted surprise checks to get an assessment of such shortcomings.

He apprised that he had suggested to the headquarters to implement a law that ensures action against people who submit false affidavits to the department of meeting all the necessary requirements.

He said that many times it had been seen that people installed faulty and cheap fire fighting equipment in their buildings to fool the department.

Kumar added that if fines were imposed on such people, they would maintain the equipment efficiently which would lead to a decrease in fire incidents.