Gandhinagar:
Two days after a video gaming zone in Rajkot burst into flames and killed 28 people, including nine
children, and left their bodies burnt beyond recognition, the city’s municipal body came under fire from the Gujarat High Court for failing to certify at least two such structures in the city.
The court was furious when told two gaming zones had been operating – for over 24 months each – without the required permits, including fire safety certificates, and said it could no longer “trust” the state government, which is controlled by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party.
“Have you gone blind? Did you fall asleep? Now we do not trust the local system and the state,” the court raged after it was told fire safety certification hearings have been running for four years.
This was after the Rajkot municipal body said, in court, that “our approval was not taken…”
“This has been going on for two-and-a-half years (referring to the Rajkot gaming zone). Are we to assume you turned a blind eye? What do you and your followers do?” the court thundered.
The hearing then went from bad to worse for the Rajkot municipal body after photographs showed officials at the gaming zone. “Who were these officers? Did they go there to play?” the court asked.
Advocate Manisha Luv Kumar Shah, appearing for the state government, also acknowledged that two other gaming zones – in Ahmedabad – did not have permission to operate, and said a special team had been formed to investigate all such issues and file a report within 72 hours.
The court also pointed to “many incidents” in the past and said, “…we have given many decisions and instructions in the past four years. Even after that six incidents took place in the state.”
Among the major fire-related incidents in Gujarat since 2023 were a blaze at a chemical factory in Surat in November that killed seven people and injured a dozen more.
A few days earlier a fire at a city multiplex destroyed property and injured two employees.
In July there was a fire at an Ahmedabad hospital that forced the evacuation of 125 patients. There was also a massive blaze in firecracker shops in an industrial area of the city in May
In March a fire at a hospital in Surat killed an infant.
“People are dying due to (state) machinery (not working)…” the irate court observed.
