BHUBANESWAR: As forests across Odisha face a wildfire crisis, the State government has intensified community awareness programme in forest fringe villages to prevent fire incidents. Village level meetings are being conducted in forest divisions across the State. Around 300 meetings have already been organised in villages of Similipal Tiger Reserve comprising five divisions - Similipal South, Similipal North, Baripada, Karanjia and Rairangpur and other peripheral areas, said forest officials.
Similar meetings are also being organised in all other wildlife and 37 territorial divisions of Forest department. On Saturday, department requested community members and volunteers of villages close to forest areas to come forward and help forest field staff in preventing wildfires.Apart from Similipal, forest fires have surfaced in many other divisions including Baliguda, Khariar, Kandhamal, Balangir, Koraput, Bargarh, Rayagada and Sundargarh. The forest fire events this season has been reported from at least 26 districts, sources said.
The department sources also admitted that many of the forest fire incidents are not being attended to at field level on time. As per a recent letter of the Forest department to DFOs, nearly 40 per cent fire points remain unresponded. Despite claiming to have taken all measures to check wildfire, the government has not been able to bring it under control as the number of large fire events in Odisha increased to an alarming level on Sunday.
Fire Alerts System of Forest Survey of India (FSI) that tracks large fire events across the country on real time basis using the data of SNPP-VIIRS (Suomi-National Polar-orbiting-Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite) recorded a whopping 918 large forest fire events, highest among all states on Sunday.
It accounted for nearly 60 per cent of the total forest fire incidents reported in the country on the day. In Similipal where parts of biosphere are facing fire for more than a week, the forest officials continued their effort to douse flames. More than 500 fire points have already been attended in the reserve this year so far.