Ravaging Forest Fires –who is accounatble?
By: Dr VK Bahuguna
(The author was Director-General of Indian Council of
Forestry Research and Education and Chancellor FRI University)
This
year like previous years the forest fires are raging the forests of India
specially the situation is very grim in Uttarakhand where thousands of hectares
of forests are burning. The fires have been raging all over Uttarakhand and
this year the situation has become very critical with some insane anti-social
and anti-national elements have been indulging in making video reels and
watching with vicarious pleasures, unfortunately enough, coupled with local
people also putting up with their annual rituals of burning the civil soyam and
reserve forests to fire to get fresh grasses for their cattle. A few such
hoodlums were arrested in Uttarakhand. It is well known to all in the society
as well as in the government that the forest fires in India occurs during November
to June months and adequate preparedness should be ensured to prevent and
quickly control it. The control of forest fires is proving the ‘Achilles
heel’ for the forest department as well as the government. In any case
the officials may want to evade responsibility by blaming the dry climate and
shift the entire blame to anti social elements but the fact is it is a sure
case of unpreparedness and unpardonable negligence by the entire governing
system in Uttarakhand and all over India when it comes to managing the forest
fires.
The
Forest Survey of India (FSI) in the State of Forest Report 2021 (SFR 2021)
which was released in the year 2022 stated that 345,989 cases of forest fires
have occurred in 2021 the highest in the country so far. Compared to 2019
almost one lakh more instances of forest fires were noticed in 2021. This
report should have alerted the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate
Change as well as the State governments all over the country. We must
understand that our forest resources are the critical resources in terms of
richness of its bio-diversity and its importance for sustaining life systems of
humans as well as the poor wild life that vanish with no requiem in official
statistics but with disastrous consequences on the ecology, water streams and
the economy. Now let us discuss the practical solutions to handle this forest
fire regime visiting our forests regularly year after year without interruptions
and once the rain god’s smile the consequences of it are forgotten by all. I
have been dealing with forest fires in the Ministry of Environment &
Forests for 7 years during 1997 to 2002 and had devised the fire fighting
strategy for the country as well as calculated the loss annually. I had also
attended the International Seminar organized by the Indonesian Government at
Bagor in the aftermath of devastating fires witnessed by the Indonesia in the
coal bearing forests as an Indian expert in the year 1999. It was very clear in
the meeting that fires are better prevented rather than waiting for the control
because once it becomes an inferno it is impossible for any technology to
control. In the Ministry of Environment and Forests in 2001 a new guideline was
issued and the high flying idea of use of planes and helicopters was dropped
because in India we do not have long stretches of forests like in Canada, USA
and Australia where aerial foams are used but with solid ground equipments.
The
first and foremost decision taken was to assign funds to FSI to use satellite
and convey the forest departments within minutes of detecting the forest fires.
This is continuing today as FSI immediately conveying the fire incidents to the
territorial staff. Each forest division must maintain, repair and clear the
forest fire lines before November month and remove the fuel load from fire
lines as well as adjoining forests. Before November each range and forest
division must have a fire prevention plan in place indicating the vulnerable
compartments and areas and prepare risk assessment and install early warning
system and put them into practice like stationing the equipment, water bag
packs etc. Areas near habitations must be mapped for risk management. Along
with these special funds were earmarked for the Joint Forest Management/ Van
Panchayats for engaging villagers and for extending help during fire seasons.
The states were directed to invoke the section 79 of the Indian forest Act under
which the villagers and government servants are duty bound to inform and help
in suppression of forest fires and for each identified area teams must be kept
ready. The Ministry must have been reinventing and reasserting these guidelines
every year. Now it is for the states to find out where they go amiss that they
feel helpless when fire occurs when a procedure is in place and why fire
surveillance/ preparedness is not in place and who is responsible for this. The
states administration and forest officers if follow a strictly planned and
supervised regimen of fire prevention and disaster control with sufficient equipment,
man power, funds and constant monitoring forest fires can mostly be prevented
and curtailed. The management of fuel load and human interference is a key
factor and supervision and mock drills before and during fire season with full
involvement of panchayats and local people is necessary for zero tolerance for
the fire incidents. A scrutiny of the standards operating procedure is
essential and the Chief Minister of each state must act because as it seems now
only political intervention can cajole the system to work.
The
Prime Minister and the Environment Minister must haul up the bureaucracy and
take drastic steps to not only prevent forest fires but tackled the increasing
instances of the landslides and other natural disasters in the country with
special focus on hill states of Uttarakhand and Himachal Pradesh. Mercifully I
must commend the Uttarakhand Chief Minister Pushkar Singh Dhami who took charge
of the situation and forced the state officials to rise from the slumber and
the results are showing at the ground level but after much damage already done.
All the political parties should cooperate in educating the people about the
perils of putting forest in fires. The negligence of foresters in the field is
well known for last few years when the larger numbers of religious structures
were made in thousands under the nose of forest guards and rangers in
Uttarakhand and thousands of hectares of forest lands were encroached. It was
only after this writer repeatedly raised the matter with PMO that the Chief
Minister took initiative to demolish a few hundreds of such encroachments but
no action has been taken against the field staff or officers in charge of
ranges and divisions. Accountability and responsibility and good clean
governance is the responsibility of all in the system and people of Uttarakhand
want to see it in full measure. 1141 words
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