At least 40 people were killed in the reactor blast at Sigachi Pharma Plant in Pas Melram area of Telangana, including factory workers. This accident raises serious questions about the safety of factories and industries across the country whether it was just negligence? Failure of Regulation? Or a deep system flaw? And the most important question that is echoing is that who is responsible for all?
Significantly, Sigachi Industries makes microcystline cellulose powder. It is a flammable and easily fire -catch powder which is used in drugs as binder, disintegrant, filler and lubricant. According to the records of the Telangana Fire Department, this pharma plant in Sigachi also caught a serious fire in September 2019, due to which there was an electrical fault and there was a loss of more than 1 crore.
Sigachi is not the only factory. Fire is common in this industrial area of Pasmalaram. In the last 8 years, 99 industrial fire incidents have been reported in Sangreddy district, of which at least 23 took place in this Pasmelram Industrial Area.
There is a cluster of several high-risk chemical and pharma units in Pasmalaram. Here more than 60 factories make excellence such as bulk drugs, active pharmaceutical ingredients, intermediates and microcystline cellulose. There is always a danger of fire in all these. There is also a zero liquid discharge and a Common Fluent Treatment Plant, which provides the infrastructure required for the wastewater management of these industries.
The industrial zone of Telangana such as GDMatla, IDA Bolram, Pasmalaram and Patcheru takes on an average every two days. A total of 1,522 fire has been recorded here in the last eight years. Only last year, the district collector Valluru Revolution ordered Salubrius Industries, Vital Synthetics and Venkar Chemical Limited to close on violation of fire safety rules by inspecting the Pas Malaram Industrial Area. A few days later, on 13 February, there was a fire in Salubrius Industries, due to which the safety rules were also said to be ignored.
Companies like Vital Synthetics did not have the necessary fire safety equipment such as fire hydrants, portable firefighters and underground water storage tanks. The Fire Control Board had given notice to this company earlier also, but still did not improve.
No Fire NOC?
As far as Sigachi is concerned, when the company prepared to bring its IPO in November 2019, in section 12 of the Red Herring Prospects sent to SEBI, it itself admitted that they have not applied for many essential licenses and approval. It also included Fire NOC for the Pass Melram plant in Telangana which makes microcystline cellulose.
Red hering prospectus makes public information related to financial, operational and risk of a company so that investors can decide before investing.
What do officers say
DG Y Nagi Reddy of Telangana State Disaster Response and Fire Services told India Today that Sigachi’s building did not have a fire NOC for this year. However, he also said that NOC was not necessary in this matter, which raises the question that how much clarity is in the law itself regarding the imperative of fire safety rules?
It was also said in the prospectus that the company did not have a pollution certificate with the company and the fire safety audit of the Pasmalaram plant was also not done. There is no public record of whether these documents were taken later or not.
Safety rules ignored in Sigachi
There are clear instructions in the Factory Act for the industries who deal with flammable dust, such as exhaust systems, ventilated machinery, dust removal, fire hydrants, heat sensors, portable fire extinguishers, underground water tanks and two outward doors should be opened in each workroom.
According to DG Reddy, Sigachi’s Telangana plant had only some firefighting equipment which were probably installed after the 2019 fire. The plant building was very old and did not have essential safety features like fire alarm, heat sensor and automatic shutdown system. That is, there was a direct violation of the rules of Telangana Fire Service Act.
He also said that no safety audit has been done by the fire department and the entire responsibility is to make the necessary arrangements according to the industrial safety. Apart from this, there were no blast-resident walls or roofs in the plant, whereas in processing areas they are necessary. The ground report of India Today also revealed that flammable things like microcystline cellulose were not being stored properly. No third-party safety audit was done and old machines were continuing to be used, while the workers had warned many times about the danger.
Questions are still left
There have been incidents such as frequent fire and closure of factories in high-risk industrial zone like Pasmalaram. Still the big question is, why is the fire NOC not compulsory in these areas? DG Reddy’s tangled statement about Sigachi’s fire NOC indicates that there is a lot of disturbance and confusion in the implementation of fire safety regulations.
‘This was not an accident, this was to happen’, this is to say Rajnala Sai Yashwant, whose father Rajnala Venkat Jagan Mohan died in this blast. His father was working in Sigachi for the last 20 years. Yashwant said that the workers had told the management many times that the old and unsafe machines should be replaced, but no one has heard. Now criminal cases such as culpable homicide, serious injury and attempt to murder have been registered on the management of the company.
Sigachi Industries gave this statement
Sigachi Industries said in a statement issued on July 2 that we are extremely heartbroken by the tragic accident at our passing plant, in which our 40 valuable team members lost their lives and injured more than 33. Our sensations are with all the people affected by this tragedy. The company further stated that unlike media reports, this accident did not occur due to the reactor explosion in the plant.
Sigachi Industries Limited also said that the company has promised an ex -gratia amount of ₹ 1 crore to the families of the deceased, while the injured will be provided with full medical and rehabilitation assistance. The activities of our plant will be temporarily postponed for about 90 days.