'No major damage' in BB fire

An inquiry team formed after the recent fire in the Bangladesh Bank headquarters submitted its report to Governor Fazle Kabir yesterday, saying there was no major damage in the incident.

The central bank formed the three-member committee led by Executive Director Ahmed Jamal to assess the damage caused by the fire, said Subhankar Saha, spokesperson for the bank.

The report said only some chairs and tables, three computers, a scanner, two printers and a photocopy machine were damaged, said BB sources.

The team, in its report, also recommended not using electronic items like water heater in the office to avoid similar accidents in future, added the sources.

Around 9:30pm on March 23, a fire broke out on the 13th floor of the BB headquarters in the city's Motijheel, but was doused after an hour's efforts.

The floor housed the foreign exchange policy department, which is responsible for formulating and implementing policies related to foreign exchange.

No one was hurt in the flame.

On information, 12 firefighting units rushed to the spot and doused the flames.

BB and Fire Service and Civil Defence formed two separate committees immediately after the incident.

The fire service formed a five-member team to find out the cause of the fire. It was asked to submit its report in five working days.

Talking to The Daily Star yesterday, Samarendra Nath Biswas, head of the committee, said the fire may have originated from an electric short circuit.

“We are conducting the probe. We suspect that the fire originated from electric short circuit,” he told The Daily Star over phone.

The probe body members visited the floor of the building and quizzed some bank officials yesterday, said Samarendra, a deputy director of the fire service.

Asked whether they have found negligence behind maintenance of electric lines, he said they were investigating into it.