HYDERABAD: Chief Secretary K Ramakrishna Rao on Thursday instructed the officials to prepare a comprehensive manual, outlining precautionary measures and action plans to prevent fire accidents in industries. He also directed them to initiate measures to prevent fire accidents in major industries and to ensure safety of workers.
During a meeting, the chief secretary reviewed the measures initiated so far with regard to the recent fire accident at Sigachi Industries. He also reviewed the payment of ex gratia to the families of the deceased workers and other affected families, as well as the progress of related court cases with the senior officials of the departments concerned.
The chief secretary, meanwhile, stated that joint inspection teams should be constituted at the state and district levels to conduct coordinated inspections across major, medium and small-scale industries throughout the state.
He emphasised the need for regular monitoring and inspections by officials to prevent fire accidents in industries. At the district level, inspection teams comprising officials from revenue, police, industries, labour, medical & health, fire services departments and the Pollution Control Board should be formed, he suggested.
Ramakrishna Rao also noted that conducting periodic inspections and uploading the details online through a dashboard would enable all departments to take timely preventive measures.
He further suggested that industries should undertake safety audits and conduct training programmes related to workers’ safety.
He made it clear that strict measures should be implemented to prevent such incidents in the future.