Guwahati, Jul 8 (PTI) Assam Chief Minister Sarbananda Sonowal on Wednesday ordered an inquiry into the fire which broke out in his conference room at 'Janata Bhawan', the state secretariat here.

A fire broke out in the conference room on Tuesday night and was doused within five minutes by police personnel posted in the capital complex.

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The chief minister directed the secretary of General Administration Department Gurudutta Laskar to inquire into the fire incident and submit a report with recommendations for upgrading the arrangements for mitigation of fire and emergency situations at Janata Bhawan, an official release said.

The chief minister highly appreciated and thanked the police officers for their proactive action. Reviewing the situation in a meeting with senior officials, Sonowal directed the authorities to set up a 24x7 control room at the state secretariat and install one way or single-pole electrical switch in each of the blocks of the secretariat.

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Sonowal asked the officials to expeditiously install CCTV in the entire campus, early completion of electrical audit of buildings, reduction of files and developing a mechanism for disposal of old files that are piled up in different departments for several years.

He further directed them to take steps for augmenting skills of the security and monitoring staff working at the secretariat and review their performance every three months.

The chief minister further instructed the Fire and Emergency Department to be fully prepared with hydraulic trolleys and modern equipment to control fire and other crisis situations in the state.

Chief Secretary Kumar Sanjay Krishna visited the incident site as per the direction of the chief minister and took stock of the damages, the release added.

(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)