TMC relaxes fire safety norms for hospitals

The Thane Municipal Corporation has decided to relax the fire safety norms for hospitals in the city. Guardian minister Eknath Shinde, members of the medical fraternity and fire officials had a discussion about renewing of hospitals registration on Wednesday. The discussion lasts around two hours over the possibilities of relaxing the fire safety norms so that hospitals can renew their registration after receiving a NOC from the fire department.

President of Indian Medical Association (IMA), Thane, Dinesh Dinkar said, “Almost 70% of the hospitals in the city are facing registration problems as they did not have the Change of User (COU) and Change of Activity (COA) due to which that we were not getting a NOC from the fire department.”

“We are going to apply for COU and have been told that the penalties will be waved off as the compliance will be based prospectively. Also, to get the COU, one will have to do the architectural changes as per the requirements are given. So it will become easier to get a no-objection certificate from the fire department,” Dinesh Dinkar added.

The officials claimed that as these hospitals are over a decade or older and did not have an OC and COU, they could not renew their registration on March 31 when it had expired. Also, the last renewal done by these people from the medical fraternity was three years ago.

“A government resolution (GR) was passed in September 2017, which stated that an illegal structure can be regularised if they pay the compounding charges as these structures will be considered as compounded structures. So as the hospitals do not have OC, we would be carrying out this procedure,” said Shashikant Kale, chief fire officer, Thane.

Relaxation of fire safety norms will help 70% hospitals in the city. Hospitals can apply for a COU and have been told that the penalties will be waved off as the compliance will be based prospectively.