RIMS fire report leaves answers in the smoke

A report says a fire broke out around midnight at the Rajiv Gandhi Institute of Medical Sciences in Adilabad and that a five-day-old infant died. It says the incident began in the children’s ward after an alleged short circuit involving an air-conditioner, but no statement from fire services, police, RIMS or the Telangana health department confirming the cause has been found.

The report says around 30 children were in the ward, several became unwell and children were moved to private hospitals. Those details, including the evacuation sequence and the infant’s medical cause of death, remain single-source claims. The exact time, ward location, fire-service attendance, police action and whether an inquiry was ordered are also not publicly confirmed in the available material.

That matters because a government hospital is not supposed to become an evidence-light crime scene. An RTI-based report separately found that RIMS had no fire-safety technicians, among other vacant technical posts; it does not establish that staffing caused this fire. RIMS and the relevant authorities still owe families a documented account, rather than leaving the facts where the smoke is.