The fire that tore through a popular nightclub in Goa on the weekend is more than a local tragedy, it is a national reckoning. Twenty-five lives, most of them young workers who staffed the venue, were lost within minutes. A blaze that seems to have begun with a gas cylinder in the kitchen spread rapidly across a crowded nightlife hub, leaving devastation in its wake. Tourists caught in the chaos added to the human cost.

Emergency teams who entered the charred structure described melted furniture, collapsed ceilings, and bodies found clustered near the kitchen, suggesting that many victims had little chance to escape. This incident forces us to confront an uncomfortable truth: India’s booming leisure and entertainment ecosystem remains perilously under-regulated. Goa, with its thriving nightlife and soaring tourist footfall, is a microcosm of this mismatch. Clubs multiply faster than oversight mechanisms, and the........

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