90 pc Dhaka buildings have no fire safety provision: Survey

Dhaka, April 03 – After the deadly fire at Banani’s FR tower the government agencies are now active to inspection high rise buildings in the capital, which finds most of them were violated building code and made the structure dangerous for residences.
According to a fire service survey, 80 to 90 percent of buildings in the capital have no arrangement for fire. The Fire Service has also asked for buildings owner as they categorized the buildings into three
types: highly risky, risky, less risky areas. But the owners have always ignored the building code as well as the safety measures for fire.
Now, RAJUK (Rajdhani Unnayan Kartripakkha) has taken part in the campaign from April 1 to investigate the overall issues of the high-rise buildings of the capital. Details of more than 10 storied multi-storied buildings have already been collected by Twenty-four teams of RAJUK that conducted the drives in different areas of the capital and on its outskirts on the third day.
Each team comprises of an authorized officer, assistant authorized officer, chief building inspector and building inspector, said RAJUK’s public relation and protocol Officer.
The RAJUK official said the teams are collection information of high-rise buildings above 9 storied to detect any faults and deviations from the designs approved by RAJUK.
The RAJUK team inspected high-rises in Gulshan, Banani, Mohakhali, Purbachal, Dhanmondi, Lalbagh, Keraniganj, Sutrapur, Wari, Motijheel, Mirpur, Bhulta, Ashulia, Dhamsena, Tongi, Uttara, Gazipur, Demara, Narayanganj, Sonargaon, Savar and other areas.
However, Ministry of Housing and Public Works committee received two designs of the FR Tower, which was damaged by a devastating fire in Banani. In the designs, one showed 18 floors and another 23 floors.
There are sixteen buildings in the row of FR tower. And most of the buildings are completely leaped on one another. Of these 13 are multi-storied buildings. A team of RAJUK visited the buildings on Tuesday and received massive irregularities.
RAJUK found several irregularities in the multi-storied building in the third day. Most of the buildings were not approved for construction following the design. Besides, there is not enough fire safety system in the buildings.
The establishments surveyed include schools, colleges, universities, shopping malls, banks, hospitals, media centers and residential hotels.
On Wednesday a team of RAJUK-4 led by director Mohammad Mamun Mia visited four buildings between 10:30 am and 1.00 pm and identified three as ‘fire-risk’ in Banani. – Staff Reporter