Commissioner of Police Shailesh Kumar Yadav is initiating disciplinary proceedings against some Inspectors of Police for giving false information in their report on safety and security aspects for issuing licence to cracker shops in the city.
A cross-check by Deputy Commissioner of Police (Law and Order) P. Arun Sakthi Kumar revealed that the officials had ignored some important safety aspects under the Explosives Rules. “Our primary objective is public safety. In the wake of two fatal accidents reported in Sivakasi and Coimbatore, we need to take extra caution while issuing licences,” Mr. Yadav told The Hindu on Sunday.
The office of the CoP had issued a questionnaire to the Inspectors of Police to be filled up upon personal verification of various aspects of safety — like building plan, nature of electricity connection, compulsory entry/exit and minimum distance around the cracker shop. “However, we found that some of them had made false reporting,” he said. The police had issued show-cause notice to 13 shops for violation of safety norms.
“We need adequate space to move fire tenders quickly in the event of a fire accident,” he said.
The Commissioner said he had asked the Corporation authorities to provide as many safe locations as possible to put up a cluster of shops by following all safety norms. “Decentralisation of the location will help even distribution of shops and easy access to shoppers,” he said.
TANGEDCO’s appeal
Madurai Electricity Distribution Circle/Metro of Tamil Nadu Generation and Distribution Corporation (TANGEDCO) has appealed to people not to burst crackers near high-tension and low-tension overhead power cables and near transformers.
In a statement issued here on Sunday, Superintendenting Engineer P. Baskar said people could prevent fire accidents by keeping crackers away from electricity facilities.
He asked people not to paste posters on pillar boxes on electric poles.
People can call the following phone numbers of TANGEDCO — 1912 (BSNL only) and 0452 2560601 during emergency.
