By P Krishna Kumar
New Delhi, Dec 7 (UNI) In the wake of the devastating fire in a Goa night club that took 25 lives, the National Restaurant Association of India (NRAI) – the apex body of the country’s branded and organised restaurant industry – on Sunday urged its members to “introspect” and take corrective action to prevent recurrence of such incidents.
“It’s a most unfortunate incident and our heart goes out to the families of the victims,” NRAI President Sagar Daryani told UNI over telephone.
While there are various stories going around as the reasons behind the fire incident, Daryani said that only a thorough inquiry would bring the facts to the public domain. However, he said that the restaurant industry takes safety very seriously and this incident is an opportunity to “introspect” and “recheck” lapses, if any, across the system and take corrective measures.
Daryani also highlighted how several staff of the ill-fated restaurant showed exemplary courage to save the lives of guests and in the process got trapped and lost their lives.
The gruesome fire accident in Birch by Romeo Lane at Arpora, North Goa, in the intervening night of Saturday-Sunday, caught both the restaurant staff as well as guests unawares and they got trapped inside in the absence of adequate escape routes.
The Travel & Tourism Association of Goa (TTAG), the umbrella body of the travel, tourism and hospitality associations of Goa, also called for strict measures on the part of the agencies to ensure restaurants and night clubs operate with stringent safety standards. “Safety measures cannot be allowed to be compromised and flouted,” said Jack Sukhija, President of TTAG.
Sources informed UNI that the night club in question was operating without a fire licence. “There are hundreds of such restaurants and pubs operating in the state without proper licences. So many of them have sprung up in the last 4- 5 years in the state,” a tourism industry source said.
“It’s a lapse of the entire system that night clubs are allowed to operate without proper permissions or licences,” he added.
Goa Chief Minister Pramod Sawant, after visiting the site ordered a magisterial inquiry. Goa MLA, Michel Lobo, has called for safety audits of all restaurants and night clubs following the Arpora accident.
