Case Study on Gujarat University

The Story of Gujarat University, Ahmedabad

Gujarat University, established in 1949, is one of the oldest and largest universities in India. Its notable alumni include Prime Minister of India Narendra Modi, Home Minister of India Amit Shah, and prominent businessman Mr. Gautam Adani. Gujarat University spreads across 260 acres and affiliates 235 colleges across the state. It has over 34 postgraduate departments and more than 50 affiliated postgraduate centers under its umbrella. Gujarat University was awarded University Level National Service Scheme Award by the President of India in 2019. The unique feature about Gujarat University is its ‘Study Abroad Program’. Under this program, students from across the world are invited every year since 2007, to learn about Indian culture, tourism, languages, Journalism, etc.

The goal of the Gujarat University Semester/Year Study Program is to offer foreign students the full breadth of Indian academics with a focus on Gandhian Philosophy, Indian mythology, culture, religions and traditions, languages, performing arts, yoga, business sciences, and other disciplines. These foreign students are provided with transit houses. The transit house was a newly constructed building and Gujarat University wanted to facilitate the building according to the international standards. The university wanted to host its students with globally accepted standards while staying connected with the Indian roots. Safety was one of the majorly focused aspects in design considerations. It was analysed that there were several causes that could raise ignition in the transit house further leading to disastrous fire.

In addition to be compliant, Gujarat University strongly emphasizes on safety and security issues. The Gujarat University aimed to ensure that everyone concerned with the staff to the students understand the requirements of fire safety in order to ensure optimum safety for all who are present in the building. They aimed to focus on life and property safety. Gujarat university wanted a solution that could match its required standards. They wanted to opt for a future ready addressable system that could pin point the exact location of fire. The installation must not involve any changes to the newly constructed building’s architecture.

 

The consultant for the project was Mr. Sundeep Chauhan of Shubham Fire & Safety.

The Challenges of Gujarat University before NFire

Gujarat University transit house is a newly constructed multi-storey building, so lengthy wiring would lead to civil work. The transit house consists of many rooms, dining halls, reading halls, etc. It was clear that Gujarat University needed completely wireless devices that blended in with the building aesthetic. In cafeterias where commercial grade kitchens are in operation to feed thousands of students and staff, unpreventable accidents in the kitchen equipment can lead to ignition of fire. Smoking and accidental fires, in the same manner can lead to life threatening scenarios. With more dense occupants in an area, the risk for fire load increases and at the same time, evacuation process gains more importance. Even in case of power cuts, terror attacks or any other emergencies, quick and planned evacuation is extremely important. One of the key requirements of Gujarat University was to have early detection so the key stakeholders can contribute to life and property safety. Major design considerations for Gujarat University were safety, technical leverage, highly reliable system that could last longer with low maintenance and installation cost.

Mr. Sundeep was given this task to find a solution that satisfied Gujarat University’s requirements completely. After analyzing the necessities, he recommended NFire Solution to Gujarat University as the perfect fit. NFire Solution is an ideal solution as it is highly scalable, cost effective and highly reliable. A site survey was conducted for Gujarat University by NFire Team.

Solution

NFire Solution is a smart integrated incidence management system. It minimizes complexities to increase the speed of communication. NFire Solution was implemented at Gujarat University. NFire provides the institution with localized alert within the premises along with centralized monitoring by NFire Emergency Monitoring Service Centre as per their requirements.

The site survey was conducted by NFire Team. Gujarat University believes that the site survey was the most valuable part of this project as it gave them confidence on the recommendation of NFire by the consultant. Working with NFire Team on the site survey put into perspective that this process should be every institution’s standard. They believe that NFire Team highlighted the risks/threats and assured NFire’s seamless functioning. N700 Panel was installed with 105 hybrid smoke detectors, 5 MCPs (Manual Call Point) and 4 outdoor sirens with battery backup. A distinctive feature of N700 panel is that it can be used as a communication system that helps in easy evacuation, it is addressable and up to 150 sensors could be added that pinpoints the exact location of fire. NFire is a customizable solution with easy installation and minimal downtime. It causes no damage to the existing structure and saves a major cost compared to any conventional or wired addressable systems. NFire solution also brings other unique features like 24×7 monitoring, advance integration with IoT, Cloud computing, Mobile technology and communication technology. It is an easily upgradable future proof technology system for next generation smart fire stations. NFire feasibly reduces operational complexity and increases the incident response speed. It is highly stable, robust and built as per UL/BIS/NFPA specifications. Along with the live emergency monitoring service, notifications are sent via live call and SMS by NFire team of highly trained monitoring officers. NFire connect app makes it easy to access NFire alarm system from anywhere.

Benefits to Gujarat University

NFire has proved to be an ideal solution for Gujarat University. Gujarat University precisely experienced half of the total civil cost for safeguarding their premises and their people. There was no lengthy wiring or masonry work which saved a lot of cost with fast installation. Live monitoring with pin point location of fire through an app is provided to the institution as demanded. The system is cloud integrated, IoT operational and AI enabled with integrated communications. NFire Solution ultimately ensures that the building was safe and operational. Moreover, Gujarat University was able to achieve higher Returns of Investment (ROI) while experiencing minimal Total Cost of Investment (TCO) with the help of NFire Solution.

More about NFire

NFire is the revolutionary wireless addressable fire alarm system, designed and manufactured in India. Manufactured with the highest quality European standards our NFire range is one of the most advanced Fire Detection Systems currently available in the market. NFire is marketed in India by Atigo Enterprises Pvt. Ltd. Growing at a fast pace, Atigo is one of the leading electronic security and safety solutions provider in India. NFire conforms to US-NFPA-10th Edition Specifications and is certified with CE, ROHS and ISO 9001-2005.

For more details, visit www.nfire.in