Tahfiz centre's new premises to be operational early next year

The new premises of the Darul Quran Ittifaqiyah residential religious school in Jalan Keramat Hujung here, which was previously scheduled to be operational in October, will only be opened early next year.

Its principal Mohd Zahid Mahmood said the postponement was due to the improvement works to meet with several safety features set by the Fire and Rescue Department.

"Yesterday, when the firefighters carried out the inspections, they asked us to make some modifications and improvements including installing smoke extraction and fire alarm bells," he told reporters here today.

Mohd Zahid said the process would take several months, before all the students could continue their studies at new building.

He said the school was looking for a temporary premises near the fire-damaged school so that the students, who were on holidays, could continue their studies soon.

Mohd Zahid said he would meet the parents of the students soon to explain the real situation.

"We will meet them (parents) because we do not want any third party to make the situation worse. The contributions we received will be distributed to the families of the victims and only a small number will be used to repair the fire-damaged tahfiz school," he said.

Meanwhile, a Bernama check at the site of the fire tragedy found that people were still visiting it to take photos and to hand over donations.

In the fire which broke out at 5.15am on Sept 14, 21 students and two teachers who were also wardens at the school died when they were trapped in the fire at the topmost floor of the three-storey building.

-- BERNAMA