It takes a culture

A fire broke out at the ESIC hospital building in Marol today.

From 2012 till mid 2018, there have been 29000 instances of fire in Mumbai .

We read, we see, we feel sorry for those who died or got injured and if we are on social media we will vent at some venal folks in government and we will share pictures of building code violations and loose wires. We’ll demand new laws and ask for the impossible-to-follow-without-flouting ones in force to be enforced. The system, we will grumble, is so corrupt and so broken, nothing will change, and then, we’ll go back to our lives.

I attended a single session of the Times Lit Fest at Mehboob Studios in Bandra yesterday. The talk was engaging but my mind kept wandering and I was relieved to leave the place an hour later.

The talk was in a shed. The entry to the shed was through a cut in the metal door, with a foot high barrier to get over and barely wide enough for one person to come in or go through, in single file.

My misgivings increased when I looked around. The event was co-sponsored by Aditya Birla Group’s Liva so the decor was predominantly fabric and thread. I couldn’t spot any fire extinguishers in the shed ( but I’d like to think there were several around) and there were lots of wires below the carpeting making for an uneven floor.

If there was to be a mishap, a stampede was almost a certainty.

The Times Lit Fest featured a galaxy of Very Important People starting with India’s newest Jnanpith awardee.

People gathered in the halls, in the open music area or milled around aimlessly. I kept thinking : good thing Lilavati Hospital is nearby — and wondered if I was over thinking the risk of fire. I’m one of those who likes to see very visible signs of safety — be it fire extinguishers or signages.

What of the organisers? The sponsors? The Very Important People? The aam aurat? Didn’t anyone hesitate to go through that cut out in a metal door?

Its likely some would have looked around and felt a twinge of discomfort but its more likely most would simply not have noticed.

It’s a culture. A culture of fire prevention. And arguably, we don’t have it.

What we do have are very brave people with expertise in fire suppression.

It’s the absence of this culture that prevents us from learning from past fires.

Its the absence of this culture that permits us to go to places that could be vulnerable to fires — even when we have a choice.

It’s the absence of this culture that prevents us from valuing smoke dampers in ventilation ducts over sparkling granite foyers in hospitals.

Its the absence of this culture that permits us to hold society events in refuge areas, block emergency exits with shoe racks and use electrical ducts as trash cans.

As this paper notes, the concept of a prevention culture is implicitly based on the concept of a safety culture. Both utilise a cultural approach but prevention culture works at a societal level. An Authority can enforce a safety culture but a prevention culture has to be built and maintained at various levels starting from the individual and the community.

If safety has to be understood and accepted as a priority, it will need each of us to be mindful of our own contribution to increasing risk and community level risk reduction will have to be built into our way of thinking.

As for me, I think I’ve gone to my last Lit Fest at that venue unless I learn of some significant improvements before the next edition is hosted there.