In response, the state govt informed apex court about steps taken to control the forest fires and said that “only around 0.1 % of the wildlife cover in the state was on fire due to such incidents.”
Deputy advocate general of Uttarakhand Jatinder Kumar Sethi told the bench of Justices B R Gavai and Sandeep Mehta that since Nov last year, there have been 398 such incidents, all caused by human activities, leading to five fatalities.
The applicant told the bench that the state is painting a “very rosy picture”, but media reports claim that the state machinery is preoccupied with election duties rather than firefighting efforts. The petitioner called for the central and state govts, as well as the principal chief conservator of forests in the hill state, to establish pre-fire strategies and a policy framework to mitigate such disasters, underscoring the vital role forests and wildlife in maintaining the ecological balance, economic health and social fabric of the hilly regions.
The court has scheduled further hearing on May 15.
