Fire brigade number in India: 101, 112 and what to say

If you typed “fire accident number” or “fire brigade number” into a phone with smoke already in the room, here is the answer first. Dial 101 for the fire brigade, or 112, the single emergency number, which also brings the fire service. Use whichever connects. Then say where you are. The rest of this page is for the day before the fire, when you can still save a number, learn what to say and find out who actually picks up in your city.

In short

• 101 is the fire number and 112 is the single emergency number. Tripura Police’s page on the Emergency Response Support System says 100, 101, 108 and the women’s helpline are integrated with 112. The 108 ambulance and the others work as before.
• If one number does not connect, try the other. Do not wait and redial the same one for five minutes.
• The fire brigade does not charge for putting out a fire. Surat’s municipal fire page says the service is free and that you should dial 101 whatever the size of the fire. Delhi’s fire service lists free fire fighting services on its menu.
• The address and a landmark matter more than anything else you say. A crew that cannot find the lane loses minutes you do not have.
• City control room landline numbers change and public lists disagree. We do not print them here. This page shows you how to find the right one and where to save it.

The numbers to save

• 101 for the fire brigade.
• 112 for any emergency, from any phone. Calls go to an emergency response centre in your state, which sends police, fire or medical help.
• 108 for an ambulance in most states. 102 is a separate ambulance number for pregnant women and children in many states.
• 100 for the police control room.

Our guide to emergency numbers in India has the full list with other helplines, and the state-wise helpline page covers numbers that differ by state. For a short guide to the three main numbers, see how to call 112, 101 or 108.

101 or 112: which one is better

Both work, and neither is the wrong choice. 101 reaches the fire service directly where it is still run that way, and 112 reaches a state emergency response centre that passes the call on. Tripura Police’s page says a person in distress can seek help on 112 through a voice call, an SMS, an email, a panic SOS request or a web request, and that the 112 India mobile app has a feature called Shout. States introduced these services at different times and in different forms, so do not assume every option works in your state. Try the app once on a calm day, with your location switched on, so you know what it asks for.

How to find your city’s fire control room

Every big city has a control room number for its fire service, usually a landline, and many people want it saved. The difficulty is that public lists of these landlines are often out of date or disagree with each other, so a number copied from a random website can be dead when you need it. Here is how to find a good one.

1. Start with the fire service’s own website. Look for Contact Us on the municipal corporation’s fire brigade page or the state fire service site. Delhi Fire Service’s contact page gives its headquarters address and a downloadable contact sheet. Check the date at the bottom of the page.
2. Check our city safety guides. We list the emergency numbers and the fire stations we could find for the city, along with local risks. For example, see the guides for Mumbai, Delhi, Surat, Ahmedabad, Pune and Bengaluru. If your city is not there, use step one.
3. Save it with the date. Put the number in your phone as Fire Control, add the city, and write the month you checked it in the note. Recheck once a year.
4. Print it for the house or the shop. A card by the door with 101, 112, the address and a landmark helps a guest, a child or a tired neighbour. Our 112 call information card shows how to make one.

Do not invent a number or trust one from a forwarded message. When in doubt, 101 and 112 are always the safe choice.

What to say on the call

Calm and short works better than fast and long. Say these, in this order.

1. Where. The city or town, the area, the street, the building or shop name and the floor. Add one landmark an outsider would know, such as a petrol pump, a temple or a school. If you are on a highway, give the kilometre stone or the nearest town and direction.
2. What is burning. A flat, a godown, a vehicle, a gas cylinder, a transformer. Say if there is LPG, chemicals, firecrackers or fuel nearby, because the crew plans differently.
3. Who is inside. How many people are trapped, on which floor, and whether anyone is hurt or cannot walk.
4. Your name and the number you are calling from. They may call back.
5. Stay on the line until the operator says you can hang up, and answer whatever they ask.

Then do three more things while you wait. Send someone to the gate or the main road to wave the fire engine in. Clear the lane of parked vehicles if you can do it quickly and safely, and read keeping rescue access clear for what a society can do before a fire. If it is a small fire in your home and you are trained, use the extinguisher, but only with the way out behind you. Otherwise get out, stay out and do not go back in for anything.

If the call does not connect

• Try the other number, 112 if 101 failed or 101 if 112 failed.
• Ask a neighbour or a passer-by to call as well, from a different phone.
• Call the nearest fire station or the police control room on 100 if you have the number, and ask them to pass it on.
• Send someone on a two-wheeler to the nearest fire station if it is close, with the address written down.

Mistakes that cost minutes

• Calling the owner, the security guard and three relatives first, and the fire brigade last.
• Waiting to see whether the fire grows. Call at the first smoke or flame.
• Giving only a locality name, or a landmark that only locals know.
• Hanging up after the first sentence.
• Locking the gate or the society entrance so that the engine cannot get in.

In a remote village the engine may be a long way off, and your call is only the first step. Read our note on what to do when there is no fire station nearby.

What we could not confirm

• The current control room landline of any single city. We found public listings that disagree, so we have not printed one. The city safety guides list what we found for each city.
• Whether 101 has been merged into 112 in every state. Tripura Police says it is integrated there, and states roll out these services differently.
• Whether SMS, email, app and web requests to 112 work in your state.
• We found no public Instagram, Facebook or LinkedIn video we could open and match, so the videos below are from YouTube.

Do this today

Save 101 and 112 in your phone, add your city’s fire control room from its official page with the month you checked it, and write your full address and one landmark on a card by the front door. Then say the address aloud once, the way you would on a call. Checked 28 October 2026.