INTRODUCTION TO SAFETY

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INTRODUCTION TO SAFETY
Introduction: The word “Safety” has also been defined in different ways in different
books, like:
1. Safety, as a matter of fact, is a concept and practice to eliminate agents of
injury or is a complex approach to the reliable control of harm.
2. Safety is a method or technique or process of elimination or control of
hazards i.e. agents of harm to the levels of acceptable tolerance as determined
by the law.
3. Safety is an organized activity based on knowledge and experience, which
controls hazards in workplace into a risk-free working environment, in which
workers can work without a chance of human injury, damage to properties,
pollution of workplace environment and/or a combination of those. Safety
fulfils professional, social & moral needs and helps to increase plant
productivity.
Therefore, within the boundaries of safety‟s emerging abilities there must exist:
1. A capacity for detection of causative factors related to existence of hazards that
can harm; and
2. The design of their practical control.
Off late, there has been a tremendous growth in awareness for safety in industries and the
most plant management meet the needs for affecting the wanted hazard control methods
and methodologies. Such actions may, at times, seem to be ordinary and too meagre for
expected outcome. The common experience reveals that injurious occurrences do repeat
time and again despite knowledge of their causes and availability of their controls with
the victim as well as with the plant management. Though the company formulates their
„safety policy‟ to provide institutional guideline to safety, which acts as a cornerstone for
company‟s safety program, implementation difficulties have been the most critical
blockage in hazard control.
Effects of Accident: The experts are of opinion that 9 out of 10 injurious events can be
predicted. A similar ratio is found true where energy in any form produces harmful
occurrences, unless appropriate controls are employed.
“If the injurious events can be predicted, they can by all means, be prevented by applying
effective control methods.”
The knowledge and experience, which exist in us, when applied properly can stop
majority of injurious events. That the knowledge and experience is not effectively used in
stopping injurious events is evident from the facts and figures that appear in „Annual
Injury Reports‟ published by NGOs or the Law Enforcing Directorates of the
Governments, like the one issued from the W B State Labor Department called
„LABOUR‟ . These year-wise reports are published in great details picking up
information of accidents from various industries in the state and citing meticulously their

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root causes and effects. According to case-studies made available from USA through
their publications:
I. The country experienced loss of 245 million workdays in 1974 due to disabling
injuries. This did cost the national economy 5.064 billion dollar.
II. In 1985, 1100 industrial accident deaths occurred in USA and 2 million workers
suffered disabling injuries. The country had to puff off 37.3 billion dollar as
accident cost. The knowledge of toll from occupational illness, that is available
with them, is even less accurate than that of injuries. A conservative estimate puts
that at least 100 thousand deaths and 390 thousand new cases of disabling
diseases occur every year resulting from exposure to toxic work environment.
No reliable figures are available in India despite the best efforts from the „National Safety
Council of India‟. The true figure could be sensational and alarming.
III. In the „Industrial Safety Chronicle‟ Jan – Mar 2007 issue, National Safety Council
covers an information that during the Phase-I construction of 66 km long Metro
Rail Transportation Service in New Delhi (from 1998 till 2005), fifty five workers
lost their lives. 43% of them were of most productive age group of upto 25 years.
IV. In Bhopal incidence of 1984, considered to be the worst disaster in the world till
now, over 3000 people died and around 300 000 persons are suffering disabling
diseases. The Government of India is spending huge amount of rupees on their
cure and rehabilitation.
V. The Telegraph dated 18th
August 2005 brings out a report that :
 Every six minute one Indian dies of road accident.
 Injuries suffered from accidents kill more than 850 thousand people in the
country every year and send 1.65 crore people to hospitals, filling up 30%
of their beds.
 The country loses Rs.55000 crore i.e. equivalent to 3% of national GDP
directly or indirectly because of injuries.
Need for safety: The new industries that are being conceived and constructed become
more complex because they are to meet the need of present time i.e. increased production
at lower cost, high efficiency, less down-time, and quick optimization period etc. A huge
financial investment is planned in such industrial projects. Any technical and engineering
deviation at any stage of the project‟s implementation and operation may prove risky and
can lead to disaster including loss of human lives and property, loss of production and
above all loss of morale among the workers, which directly or indirectly affect their
interest in work and hence the efficiency. Management should therefore keep the safety
aspects of the plant at their heart and pay it the higher priority along with production,
productivity, cost and quality of products. Safety should be made an integral part of plant
at all stages i.e. construction, operation, maintenance, modernization, de-bottlenecking
and expansion. Even a single unsafe act from one of the employees can lead to disaster.
The population living outside the plant perimeter gets affected as well by incidences like
air/water pollution and fires from plant sources, which create serious social and financial
adversity for the management and the local administration. It is therefore necessary that
latest fool-proof safety system is designed, incorporated, maintained and kept operational

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always. Management must believe that safety is a (I) moral imperative, (ii) legal
requirement, (iii) cost benefit approach, (iv) human factor approach and (v) professional
need. It is very hard to keep up sustained profitability without management‟s all time
apparent and visible involvement in safety.
The Government’s approach: The recent years have prompted the Government to
enforce stronger legislation in an attempt to build in the wanted safety applications in the
plant process technology and in its working methods. The Factories Act 1948 has been
amended by act 20, 1987 and new Rules called „Control of Industrial Major Accident
Hazardous Rules, 1990‟ came into force. To provide and monitor social security schemes
and welfare measures for the benefit of over 8.5 million building and other construction
workers „The Building and Other Construction Workers Act, 1996‟ is made operable in
the country from 1996. Environment (Protection) Act, 1986 has been made more
stringent with in its ambit the „Hazardous Wastes (Management and Handling) Rules,
1989 and Chemical Accidents (Emergency planning, Preparedness and Response) Rules,
1994. Legal requirements do not themselves optimize safety. At the best they may create
a climate and awareness for study and enhancement of means to attain the desired safety
objectives. Merely knowing the law and its fulfillment requirements will never make
safety efforts effective to its optimum level. It is necessary that
“The spirit and the letter of law are understood and fulfilled”
for that to take place.
If the safety specialist deals with the problems of work-injuries, the control of possible
Occupational disease-causing aspects of work environment has to be the special province
of Industrial Hygienist.
“Industrial hygiene is a science and art devoted to the anticipation, recognition,
evaluation and control of those environmental factors or stresses arising in or from
workplaces which may cause sickness, impair health and wellbeing, discomfort and
inefficiency among workers, citizen, and community.”
The two have obvious relationship, they are professionally inseparable, and their control
methods are closer altogether.
Occupational Disease is defined by experts as:
“Diseases known under prescribed conditions, to arise out of exposure to substances or
dangerous condition of processes, trades or occupations”.
The Indian Factories Act, 1948 has, under the third schedule, prescribed a list of 29
diseases generally contracted from industrial occupations.
In order to implement safety practices with stronger impetus and strength The Central
Government has given the law enforcing authority greater power. The Government of
India has identified 29 industries involved in „Hazardous Processes‟. The list is given in
the first schedule of the Factories Act 1948 (as amended in 1987). They are the
industries, which carry out processes or activities, where unless special safety cares are

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taken, raw materials in use therein or the intermediate or finished products, bye-products,
wastes or effluents thereof would –
I. Cause material impairment to the health of the persons engaged in or connected
with the process operation;
II. Result in pollution of general environment
“Health is defined as an adjustment of the individual to his physical, mental, and social
environment rather than absence of disease.”
One of the major factors that affect men at work is the presence of various chemical
substances in the working environment. The Factories Act, 1948 (as amended in 1987)
brings out a list of 430 hazardous chemicals, which are either toxic or flammable or
explosive. The Factories Act (as amended) suggests that one must refer to „Material
Safety Data Sheet (M S D S)‟ of chemicals before its use, handling and/or transportation.
MSDS gives information about the physical, chemical, and toxicological character of the
chemicals, possible effects of the chemicals on health of workers on exposure, limit of
their threshold value (TLV) as identified by AGIH and suggests the methods of
safeguarding.
Obstacles in implementing Safety: There are a number of factors that add difficulty to
solve the safety problems, the most troublesome of them is the universal failure to see
that the hazard control in industries is a complex problem. It is viewed as a simple matter
of applying a few specific routines like wearing helmet, shoes, and fastening a safety belt.
In most cases routines are repeated regularly despite obvious signs that they are
inadequate and/or ineffective and are not job specific. It is greatly needed that the
organization understand the sources of harm, and control them at their basic origins in
spite of the fact that their consequences differ in character and severity. This
understanding gives us a realization that
 Hazards are not the simple agents, and they should be closely identified with
injuries.
 Mere regulating them is not the sure way of limiting their effect.
It is, in fact, necessary to employ the means that can control the causes responsible for the
presence of injurious agents. Control requires action, but the steps planned for applying
corrective actions must be acceptable to management. They are to meet the safety
objectives without interfering significantly with other aims of management (i.e.
production, productivity, cost, quality etc.), which might get hindered. It is often seen that
safety‟s requirements conflict with financial restraints, convenience, or other factors.
When other priorities must be considered great enough, control actions for safety should
never be optimized. In recent years the growing demand for safety is being viewed ahead
of the priority for production and productivity for the company to stand firm in business
competition. Some management even worked out the „cost-benefit analyses‟ in
application of legal, engineering, administrative controls to solve safety related problems
and have benefited.
Knowledge & information is key in safety: The implementation of safety depends on
information and judgment. Decisions are made in accordance with „what is known‟ about

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the problem. Unfortunately, knowledge about safety is still gravely limited. One
significant area of inadequacy lies in classifying the results of safety violations that lead
to accident. The term accident commonly describes unplanned events producing injuries
and/or property damage. Normally, it does not include occupational diseases and
psychological shock. But safety management is expected to control them all. Good health
and safe performance ensures an accident free industrial environment. With the
continuous and untiring efforts of various legislative authorities as well as institutions,
the awareness on „occupational health and safety‟ has improved considerably.
Organizational management has started attaching the same importance to safety as they
do to other key aspects of their business activities. They are viewing and working
continuously to achieve „Zero Accident‟ in 3 to 5 years. They are working hard to
eradicate all the hazard producing agents through application of „Continuous
Improvement Action Plan for Safety‟ in all segments of their plant. This demands
adoption of a structured and systematic approach for identification of hazards, their
evaluation for control of hazard potential. The Factories Act, 1948 (as amended in 1987)
and Environment Protection Act, 1986 suggest the hazardous industries to introduce in
their factories a comprehensive „Safety Audit and Continuous Improvement Action Plan‟
for their success towards achieving „Accident Free Production‟. This is no doubt a
difficult task but they are achievable provided the Factory Management wants it with all
their hearts, have an effective, positive and optimistic in approach safety policy,
formulate safety program that would basically deal the identification of hazards coupled
with the means to contain or minimize such hazards.
Management responsibility: Knowledge of Laws, regulations and recommendations
will serve useful purpose when management takes keen interest to promote safety in the
industry, and if the safety organization is constituted of qualified, knowledgeable and
experienced persons. The responsibilities for all the aspects of labor protection,
delegation of safety responsibility down the line of managers & supervisors and the
status, authority and activities of safety engineers lie with the management of the factory.
In many industries in India the compliance with safety and industrial hygiene regulations
as well as that of labor laws is done by trade unions. Management should take the lead in
promoting and maintaining high safety standards and create safety awareness among
workers through practical measures intended to:
 Reduce frequency of industrial accidents and occupational diseases, reduce where
possible direct exposure of workers in work-areas classed as ”Hazardous and
Dangerous”, provide recommended PPEs, carry out comprehensive programmes to
improve working conditions, safety and industrial hygiene.
 Promote measures to make working conditions for women safer and more hygienic.
 Use the achievements of science and technology for improving the conditions of work
and for protection of labour and environment.
 Enforce and supervise compliance with safety standards and sanitation rules during
design, construction or suggest substantial alteration of industrial plants, machinery
and equipment.
 Awaken and maintain the interest of workers in the prevention of accidents and in
ensuring their cooperation in drives for safety at work and in fail-safe working of
machines and equipments they operate.

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Among the many objectives of the management of a factory that covers production,
productivity, cost, cost-control etc. the manufacturing industry through many research &
technological advancement has rendered the work easier and safer. Mechanisation and
automation in process operation has reduced and in certain cases has eliminated the
exposure of workers physically in hazardous condition of work and eliminated hand
labor. Factory work now needs less physical work but more information, training and
better decision-making capacity among workers.
“Better the information & knowledge, safer are the decision they make. Poorer the
information and knowledge, poorer are the decisions.”
It is not surprising that in many factories special & intensified attention is being paid on
„Human behavior‟ in workplaces as the psychological overload and job-stress of the
factory-workers have increased greatly in operating the modern technology and
equipment. Under such conditions new discipline as „ergonomics‟ also known as
engineering psychology is of high importance in promoting safety and accident
prevention requirements. The above said essentials render the factory work easier,
comfortable and develop “safety mindedness” among the factory personnel.
Safety and Productivity: Safety and Productivity are closely linked with each other. The
following points or situations bring out some of the facts:
1. When a worker is mentally ensured that he is working in a safe working
condition, his life and limbs are safe, and his workplace is free from hazards that
may affect his health, then in such situation the morale of the worker will be high
and he will possibly work with better zeal and interest and give more production.
Productivity will then increase.
2. When an organization is free from hazards and the accident-rate is low enough
then the workers are assured of safety. They are psychologically boosted up and
work culture improves a great. The managers pay more attention to their
managerial functions viz. planning, organizing, staffing, directing, coordinating,
controlling etc., which in turn improves production and productivity.
3. When the workplace is not conducive to safety and the severity-rate of accidents
is alarming year after year, then in such situation the workers remain pessimistic,
always expecting the worst to come to him or to his co-workers. Their gloomy
faces exhibit their disinterest to work. The production suffers and so the
productivity.
4. Absentee-ism of workers is directly related to number of reportable accidents in a
factory. Idle machine, idle work-hours, interruption to production process etc.,
subsequent to an accident occurrence, bring down quantity of production and
create IR problems. It is often seen that to bring back the morale & interest of
workers vis-à-vis the productivity is a lengthy process. Accident always brings
setback to company‟s reputation in the business market since it adversely effects
the date of product delivery.
5. Accident costs and commercially it gets added to production cost. In the present
market scenario it is very difficult to compete with higher saleable cost.
Production and productivity gets effected.

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“It is rightly said that “Methods of accident prevention is analogous with the
methods required for control of quality, cost and quantity of production.”
Factors impending Safety – There has been a belief that to provide safety measures and
follow the recommended safety practices is both expensive and has negative impact on
plant‟s production and profits. For example, management sometimes on this plea keeps
the mechanical ventilation system in hazardous industries out of line since they consume
energy and man-power and are costly. It is by all means an incorrect decision. On the
contrary it has been proved that improved production & better productivity are
concomitant with safe-workplace environment, which an effective ventilation system
provides. Growing emphasis should therefore be given by organization to integrate safety
into professional management following the principles of planning, directing,
coordinating, evaluating and correcting, which is so important for every management
who believes in modern business management practices. They must understand that high
standard of efficiency and productivity is not achievable unless safety is prioritized at
higher place and due importance is attached to it by all at hierarchy in the management.
High standard of safety can be a reality with the corporate effort of all concern and can be
sustained through collective effort of one and all.
“The experienced Plant manager knows that safety is good business. He knows that it is
good business to accept safety as a management responsibility to establish policies,
procedures and practices under which every member of management will clearly
understand that the safety of employees is a primary responsibility at all times and it is
not to be sacrificed or jeopardized in any way.” – Harry W. ANDERSON