Kolkata: More than 100 hotels and guest houses across Kolkata stared at closure as civic and fire officials on Saturday continued the inspection of safety compliance and statutory clearances at these establishments. The city’s hotel room inventory was estimated to have shrunk by around 1,500 in just three days.The crackdown follows the fire at a lodge on Free School Street early on Wednesday, when nine people, seven of them from Bangladesh, died of asphyxia. Since then, joint teams of the fire department, KMC, police and CESC officials have been doing the rounds of hotels and lodges and sealing establishments, which they have been finding flouting safety norms.On Saturday, Hotel Crystal, City Guest House, Hotel Aqsha Palace, RR Guest House and at least nine other lodges in the Marquis Street-Free School Street area were ordered to shut down. Guests staying at several of these hotels were asked to vacate within hours. Minister Agnimitra Pal, who visited Marquis Street hotels on Saturday, said, “Notices do not work. If there are guests, give the hotels 24 hours and then seal those establishments. If all their papers are in order, the lodges can be reopened.”Blaming the previous Tronamool govt for allegedly allowing hotels to operate without proper permissions, Pal said, “Earlier, percentages used to reach party functionaries’ homes. Now, irregularities cannot be rectified by paying money.”But hotel operators questioned the urgency of the action. Dipto Saha, manager of Hotel Crystal, pointed out that his fire licence expired in April but the establishment had fire alarms, smoke detectors, water sprinklers and additional entry and exit points. “We have applied for a new licence but were told on Saturday that it was disallowed. I don’t know on what grounds it was disallowed and why we need to shut,” he said.The closures have caused anxiety among hotel employees. Chaitanya Das, an employee of Boran Guest House, said the management had asked the staff to go on leave until the hotel reopened. “What will happen to us now?” he said, worried about his job and the uncertainty about the Durga Puja bonus.The fire department on Saturday issued fresh show cause and closure notices to 25 more hotels and guest houses in places like Baithakkhana Road, MG Road, VIP bazaar, Panchasayar, Joka and Ekbalpore. TOI visited Vinayak Guest House, Glory Lodge, Ananda Niketan and Sonar Basa Guest House on Baithakkhana Road and found closure notices pasted on them. Employees said they had been instructed to ensure guests left within 24 hours.Members of a hotel association, which represents over 350 guest houses, lodges, hotels and restaurants in Kolkata, held a meeting on Saturday to deliberate on the KMC and fire department’s closure order. With the govt agencies unwilling to have a dialogue, association officials said they were contemplating legal redress and would take a decision next week. “Civic and fire officials are serving notices and telling us to ask guests to leave within 24 hours. Many of our guests are from Bangladesh and a large number of them are patients. We suggested they gave us a month or two to meet the requirements and then, shut us down if we failed. But no one is willing to listen,” a hotel owner and member of Calcutta Hotel & Restaurant Owners’ Association said.The crackdown has also prompted hotels in the New Market area, which are still open, to reassess their safety arrangements. “We have all the permissions. We just hope we are not asked to shut as well,” said a Lindsay Street hotel manager.(With inputs from Sukhomoy Sen)
