New Delhi: While Uttarakhand continues to battle massive forest fires spread across several districts, with at least seven people dead and hundreds of villages destroyed, Himachal Pradesh now faces a similar situation, with damage to 50 hectares of woodland in Shimla in a week.
Himachal Pradesh CM Virbhadra Singh, however, downplayed the fires and said the situation was “fully under control” and “cannot be compared with Uttarakhand”.
There was brief panic among students of a boarding school in Kasauli on Monday as fires in the adjoining districts spread towards the educational institution, that led to an immediate evacuation of the children.
Uttarakhand governor K.K. Paul on Monday briefed Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the forest fires, with the latter extending all support from the Centre.
President Pranab Mukherjee also shared his concern with the governor and expressed his condolences to families which had lost their relatives in the forest fires.
Meanwhile, two IAF helicopters made nine sorties from Nainital and Pauri on Monday to pour water. NDRF officials said the situation was likely to come under complete control by Tuesday. “We have extensively brought down the number of locations under fire,” said the officials.
