Excelsior Correspondent
UDHAMPUR, June 25: Entire remote area of Dudu and Basantgarh Sub Divisions besides Latti Tehsil of district Udhampur, is without a Fire and Emergency Station and there is a popular demand of the locals of the area to have at least two such stations there.
“This belt is snow bound and over 90 % of the houses in this belt are made of wood and tin sheets. Many fire incidents take place in the area quite often but despite old demand of the people of this area, the Government failed to establish even a single Fire Station in this entire stretch spread over an area of about 165 kms right from Chenani to Ramnagar,” said Sagar Chand Sarpanch Basantgarh.
Latti Development Committee Chairman, Kasturi Lal Gupta (Sarpanch) and Sarpanch Dudu Dev Raj said that about a week ago, a three storey building was gutted at Thirdu village near Dudu. Nothing could be saved despite efforts by the locals and the entire building was reduced to ashes within half an hour. They said nearby Fire Station is at Chenani which is nearly 80 kms away and Ramnagar Fire Station about 85 kms from Dudu. It takes over three to four hours to reach at Dudu due to bad road condition.
They said Latti town is thickly populated and about 4-5 such incidents took place there in the recent past. In Panchount, Gursala and Jakhed also major fire incidents took place during last few months where property worth crores was destroyed.
They claimed that at Latti town, land along with a structure has already been identified and offered to the Government through DC Udhampur for sanction of Fire Station but the file is gathering dust in the Home Department for the last several years. Even former DC, Indu Kanwal Chib had recently sent a letter to the Government for the urgent need of Station there. They said Basantgarh town also deserves separate Fire Station because it is about 45 kms away from Latti town and nearly 65 Kms from Ramnagar.
These public representatives sought the intervention of Lt Governor Manoj Sinha and the Chief Secretary, JKUT, AK Mehta towards this urgent matter and pleaded that people of this area be provided some relief by setting up two new separate Fire Stations in this remote and neglected sub region of Jammu.
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