Remains of a city

The Centre had put Kolkata on red alert after the German Bakery blast in Pune. But apart from some extra policing, there was really nothing to show that the city was keeping vigil. As the flames leapt out of the windows, desperate citizens asked again and again, is this how we are going to deal with a crisis?

The first fire engines came in after 10 minutes. They were ill-equipped to put out even a gully fire. They had no masks, ropes, ladders, tarpaulin nets and so forth. In the first crucial 30 minutes, people panicked and at least five leapt to their deaths, caught between the raging fire and the lack of help. Citizens and terribly unprepared firemen rescued a few, but it was evident that even the water jets couldn?t reach the fifth and sixth floors where the fire was spreading.

By the time full-fledged help arrived?this was via the skylifts stationed in the suburbs of Salt Lake and Behala, and these took their time in coming because of the traffic?the fire had been raging for 85 minutes. The death toll will rise. People will not be able to forget that many lives could have been saved if only the fire department and the caretakers of the heritage building had been better prepared.

If only the caretakers hadn?t sealed off the exits when two floors were added in the eighties. If only the corporation hadn?t legalised the addition of two floors after initially terming it illegal. If only fire drills were carried out regularly. If only heritage structures where apartments and offices were cramped together were taken care of to avoid such disasters.

There are so many reasons to look after Stephen Court well.

After all, it houses some of the city?s best-known eateries, from the iconic confectionary Flury?s to the restaurant Peter Cat, which have never been short of customers.

In a way, the manner in which the administration handled the Park Street fire represents the way West Bengal is governed. There is never any pre-emptive action. The administration reacts to incidents and then promptly forgets about them. In the past two years, there have been at least three devastating fires, and we seem to have learnt nothing from these.

Even as the fire raged, the blame game started. Opposition leader Mamata Banerjee blamed the state government. The fire ministry passed the buck to the building?s caretakers for not being able to give them a plan so that the fire could be fought properly. The police pointed fingers at the corporation for legalising the two top floors and so forth.

Whenever there is a crisis, the government and the opposition first trade charges instead of trying to get to the bottom of it for a solution. When the lights went out at Eden Gardens during an international match months back, a blame game followed, but till date no one has cracked the whodunit. Even while handling critical issues like the Maoist siege, West Bengal has dragged its feet and let matters reach a head before the Centre intervened to send in troops. In this, the opposition is no better.

Mamata, who openly sided with Maoists during Nandigram and Singur, has never come out with a clear stand on Maoists. Now, municipal elections are round the corner, and both parties are busy preparing the ground for the semifinals?these polls will be a test for the Assembly polls next year.

The winds of change are blowing in Bengal. They are against the Left, but are they necessarily in Mamata?s favour? A year after she became the Union railway minister, people are slowly realising that she has made many promises, kept few. She promised a lakh jobs at Dankuni when the project is yet to take off. All she seems to have done, point out her critics, is flag off new trains. Allegations of party corruption from a rebel poet haven?t helped either.

Will things be better if Mamata comes to power in 2011? West Bengal can ill afford another term of bad governance, or lack of it. In the meantime, the absurd drama continues.

Incidentally, Bengal has a fire minister. He has been going hammer and tongs at the lack of fire preparedness at the special club lounge Kolkata Knight Riders have put up at the Eden Gardens. It?s from this Rs 32,000 a seat lounge that Kolkata Knight Riders boss Shah Rukh Khan and friends watch the team matches. If only the minister had paid a little more attention to other fire hazards waiting to blow up. We have let our best known address go up in flames, and we have only ourselves to blame.