LUCKNOW, June 24 -- The commercial building fire in Lucknow's Aliganj area that killed 15 people on Monday has triggered a wider policy rethink in Uttar Pradesh, with the state government examining changes to fire safety norms for low-rise buildings that are residential on paper but function as coaching centres, clinics, offices, guest houses and shops or for any other commercial activities. At a high-level meeting chaired by chief minister Yogi Adityanath on Tuesday, senior officials from the fire services, development authorities, municipal bodies, power and electrical safety departments discussed corrective measures aimed at plugging the regulatory gaps exposed by the Lucknow tragedy, officials said. Sources said among the key suggestions discussed was a proposal to lower the height threshold for mandatory fire no-objection certificate (NOC) from 15 metres to 12 metres so that more low-rise commercial buildings can be brought under direct fire-safety oversight. Officials also discussed creating a dedicated mechanism to identify commercially used residential buildings, enforce compliance across departments and close loopholes that currently allow such structures to escape rigorous checks. A senior fire department official said the concern stems from a mismatch between building rules and actual ground use. Under the National Building Code (NBC), the requirement for a fire NoC for buildings up to 15 metres was relaxed in 2016, a provision Uttar Pradesh adopted in 2022. The NBC has since raised that threshold to 24 metres in 2026, though the state has not yet adopted the latest revision. "The fire has exposed the danger of treating height alone as the basis of fire risk. A large number of buildings below 15 metres are being used as high-footfall commercial premises, but the scrutiny around them is not keeping pace with the risk," the official said. Officials said the meeting also focused on the growing danger posed by commercially used residential buildings where electricity consumption, occupancy and evacuation load rise sharply without corresponding upgrades in wiring, exits, ventilation and fire-fighting systems. In the Aliganj case, around 40 kilowatts of power was allegedly being used against a sanctioned load of 20 kilowatts, making electrical overloading a key line of inquiry in the ongoing probe. The scale of the challenge is particularly stark in Lucknow. After the Levana Suites hotel fire in September 2022, the LDA informed the high court that around 18,000 residential buildings in the city were being used commercially. Officials now estimate that the number may have crossed 25,000 by 2026. Statewide, the figure could run into lakhs. The tragedy has brought renewed focus on how many of these properties fall into a regulatory grey zone: too short to trigger strict fire scrutiny under existing norms, yet too commercially intensive to be treated like ordinary residential buildings. Officials said many such structures were originally sanctioned as houses but later converted into coaching hubs, office spaces, clinics, shops and mixed-use establishments, often with narrowed staircases, sealed windows, encroached setbacks, enclosed parking and electrical loads far beyond original design limits. The meeting also underlined the need for better coordination among departments. At present, development authorities deal with sanctioned maps, land use and action against unauthorised construction; fire services examine alarms, extinguishers, exits and emergency access where certification is required; electrical safety authorities monitor wiring and load and municipal bodies regulate trade permissions and civic compliance. Officials acknowledged that this fragmented system often leaves commercially used low-rise buildings slipping through the cracks. The state government is now expected to examine whether Aliganj fire should become the trigger for a broader overhaul of UP's approach to low-rise commercial fire risk. For the administration, the lesson from the blaze is clear: the state's fire-safety challenge no longer lies only in high-rises and malls, but increasingly in ordinary-looking low-rise buildings that function as dense commercial spaces without matching safety safeguards....