Minister for Forests, Ecology and Environment Choudhary Lal Singh today visited different areas in Raika and Bathindi areas and personally supervised the overnight operations launched in the areas to control wildfire. Director Soil Conservation Ravi Kessar, Director Social Forestry Suresh Chugh, Chief Conservator of Forests Roshan Jaggi, Joint Director Forest Prtotection Force Kh. Qamar-ud-Din besides other senior officers of Forest and its allied departments accompanied the Minister. The Minister appealed the public to cooperate and render all assistance to the forest department for preventing the forest fires. He said the Forest Department has registered cases under different sections of the Forest Act against some of the suspected persons who have been found involved in kindling fire to the forests deliberately. The Minister said that the department has been taking assistance and support from the fire services department and local people as well.
He informed that the fire control teams comprising of territorial forest department, forest Protection and various other allied wings of the Forest Department have been making all out efforts round the clock to prevent and control the incident of fires.Minister said he was personally reviewing the situation on daily basis from the concerned headquarters and directions have been issued to field staff for regular patrolling to avoid fire incidents besides timber and firewood thefts.He also issued strict instructions to the DFOs as well as to the field staff to remain vigilant to control the situation and directed to identify those elements who have been indulging in setting the forests on fire for ulterior motives.It was informed to the Minister that in last 2 months, around 121 fire incidents took place in various forests of Jammu, Kathua, Udhampur, Reasi and Rajouri districts of Jammu region and that the department has been successful in controlling most of these fires in a time period ranging between 2 hours to 10 hours and no major damage has been caused to the forests.