As many as 608 residential buildings in Ahmedabad have no valid fire “no-objection certificate” (NOC) as of Thursday, said the Ahmedabad Fire and Emergency Service.
Multiple cases were filed against the commercial buildings in Ahmedabad for not having valid NOC but they complied and there are only two commercial buildings where the process for fire NOC is going on.
The residential buildings are required to take the fire NOC after the building is constructed and before the building use permit, as per the Gujarat Fire Prevention and Life Safety Measures Act, 2013. However, the fire NOC needs to be renewed every year.
It is now that action has been taken against these residential buildings by the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation (AMC). Water connections have been stopped in about 23 residential buildings of which 11 are in eastern Ahmedabad and 12 in the western part. This is only the first slot of the total 608 buildings in Ahmedabad. Similar actions will be taken against the remaining buildings in case of non-compliance.
Bhatt said the notices to the buildings that had not renewed the annual fire NOC started about one-and-a-half years ago, before the public interest litigation (PIL) was filed in the Gujarat High Court concerning fire safety in the high-rise buildings in the state. The final notice was issued to these buildings in June 2022.
As per the data, only 3,483 buildings, including school, residential buildings, commercial buildings, hospitals, malls, etc, had valid NOCs in 2020, before the PIL was filed in the Gujarat High Court. In January 2023, 9,719 such buildings had the valid fire NOCs. There are about 10,469 buildings under the AMC jurisdiction that should have a valid fire NOC.
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