Of the 151 fire incidents reported in last one week,at least 95% were forest fires With the temperatures remaining nearly 10-12 degrees Celsius above normal,amid the extreme dry weather conditions,forest fires are spreading fast across the state. Nearly 150 fire incidents across six districts of the state were reported in the last one week. And the summer has only begun. In a meeting with Principal Secretary (Home) Subhash Negi,Additional Director General of Police (Home Guards and Fire Services) B Kamal Kumar sought the home departments intervention to seek more cooperation from the forest department and urban local bodies to tackle the situation. In the last one week,151 cases of fire were reported and at least 95 per cent of them were forest fires in Shimla,Solan,Mandi,Sirmaur and Dharamshala. Most of them were reported from areas situated far from the nearest fire stations. As a result,the fire had multiplied manifolds by the time fire tenders accessed the forests. We feel the forest department and municipal committees should take more responsibility in preventing fire incidents,which can be reduced by 60 per cent, he said. The fires reported in the last couple of days from forests in Kuthar areas of Solan district and Kharapathar,Sheelghat,Narkanda and Taradevi area in Shimla are still raging. The forest department,meanwhile,is set to launch a massive forest path clearing drive to prevent fires. The process to set a weekly system of reporting fire incidents from across the state,in order to put in place a mechanism to fix responsibility,is already on. A general assessment of forest fires shows that usually the fire starts from areas near a road or access point to the forest like trails and bridle paths,due to human errors lit cigarette butts or matches thrown in the woods. A large workforce is set to be deployed on temporary basis across all forest divisions of the state to clear pine needles and other inflammable forest discard at least 10 metres on each side of the forest trails and bridle paths to prevent fires. The action is set to be extensive in areas with Chir forests (highly inflammable tree species), said Principal Chief Conservator of Forests Vinay Tandon. The forest clearance will be taken up as an ongoing process from April 15 to June 15. Additional deployment of 10 Home Guards at Divisional Forest Officer level in more fire-prone districts is also being worked out. According to official information,the fire department has 22 fire stations that have 73 vehicles and a majority of them are over 25 years old. There is a proposal to add 25 new fire vehicles to the fleet this year,say government officials.
