The only fire that smolders at Dhaktallem is fear. 6 deaths, Rs 3.5 crore in compensations andan year later, not much has changed.
History has a strange way of repeating itself and Vasco didnot learn its lesson from the past. Last year on August 19, a naptha leakcaught the State Disaster Management Administration napping. The naptha fireburnt for over a week as fire fighters from Indian Navy and Goa State Fire andEmergency Services kept battling the flames. But most importantly, the rootcause of the fire- the pipeline still remains.
The 11 km long naphtha pipeline that runs from MormugaoHarbour till Zuari Indian Oil tanking still runs under the NH17B four lanestretch. “The High Court of Bombay had asked the State to shift the pipelineout of the width of the four lane highway land last year. The State wassupposed to get that done by January 31 this year”, says NHAI Project DirectorP S Dodamani. Six and a half months later while the construction of the balance5.2 kms of NH17B is held up, the naptha pipeline still runs under theunconstructed highway. The land had beenhanded over by the state PWD to NHAI free of any encumbrances on July 8, 2008,the naptha pipeline was never counted in.
But an underground running naptha pipeline isn’t the onlyproblem that persists. The residents who live on the side of the pipeline stillaren’t aware of safety protocols. “The authorities and Zuari did turn up infull strength in support of the people who were affected but the people stillare not aware of the security drills and protocols that should happen duringsuch eventualities” says former local Councillor Anil Chopdekar. Chopdekar andmany local residents recollect how swathes of curious residents stooddangerously close to the fire, blocked fire tenders and rescue personnel frommoving in close to the site of the fire.
The whole of the hillside that got affected by the fire mayhave been compensated well but basic issues of accessibility remain. In whatwould be dubbed as the most bizarre cases of fire management, the runoff fromnaptha fire on Mangor hill went down the hill and caught fire in August 20, dayafter the fire scorched three people near Varunapuri. The rescue operation downin the valley rendered useless due to the absence of access roads. The areastill remains accessible.
