Fire, fire burning bright...!

This is an image taken from the dinamina online edition, which shows the incinerated kiribathgoda seylan bank building. Apparently the same building had caught on fire three months earlier as well.

There is a ICTAD published manual on fire safety regulation for buildings in Sri Lanka, but no one seems to be adhering to any regulations these days. Pay the TO at the MC 500 bucks and you can build anything you want. Better yet, pay the bugger Rs 15,000 and you can get the approved council drawings for a 5 storied building (real story)

Bottom line is that there should be a more methodical way of getting council drawings approved. The existing system has become a joke, and everyone knows it, but no one wants to do anything because this is much more convenient. The professional bodies such as the IESL and SLIA should do something about this before its too late. well its already too late, but as they say, its better late than never.