Hiding forest fire information made an offence in PTR
Hiding forest fire information made an offence in PTR
07 April 2018
Published by http://www.dailypioneer.com/
INDIA – Not reporting of any outbreak of fire in tiger reserve Palamu has now been made a cognizable offence.
The forest guard concerned and the fire-fighting squad of locals will face stern action, said field director PTR M P Singh. Singh held a meeting with eight rangers of PTR on Friday.
The Field Director said, “I have asked the rangers to convey this to all concerned with anti fire management in PTR not to hide or conceal any incident of fire nor to trivialize the fire by dubbing it as small when in fact it is huge as in both the events severe action will be taken against the staff like forester, forest guards, rangers and locals fire fighting forces to miss their honorarium.”
Every incident of fire has its history and this must be unfolded he said saying just to ascribe any fire as manmade or caused by mahua pickers will not do as forest guards are hereby given strict warning to delve deep into the cause behind the incidence of fire in PTR, added Singh.
What if some smart forest guards who armed with higher qualification than required for the job play tricks he said such a trick will be aborted as senior officials will match the reporting with the images of the PTR with the satellite data.
PTR is now equipped with 58 fire blowers but its operation is yet to take place. Sources said it requires training and experience both.
Singh said he has asked the rangers to keep these blowers on 4 hours a day in such areas where there is a history of outbreak of fire and the cut fire lines are again littered with dry leaves.
Such littering of dry leaves is to be removed with the blowers.
On water front there is more caution as water bodies and water holes in PTR require immediate refreshining.
As many as 314 water holes are to be monitored on a weekly basis and photos of it are to be taken for scanning by senior officials to know the status of water in it said Singh.
Sources said water bodies in PTR are drying up and with the rising Sun drying up will be much faster.
PTR has a history of reaching water for its wild life through tankers in summer and this summer is not going to be any different.
