NEW DELHI: There are at least 600 forest fire points in India at present, including 30 large fire events that have been active over three days in the Central and Southern regions.The Forest Survey of India’s fire tracking portal showed on Saturday that Maharashtra has the highest number of forest fire points, followed by Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Odisha and Chhattisgarh. In terms of large fire events, Andhra Pradesh is at the top followed by Maharashtra.Maharashtra has 134 forest fire points, six of which have been raging for more than three days. Andhra Pradesh has eight major fire events out of 94 forest fire points. While Telangana has 82 fire points at present and five large fire events, Odisha has 63 fire points and two large fire events. (see table)According to NASA’s Fire Information for Resource Management System, the spatial resolution of the Visible Infrared Imaging Radiometer Suite (VIIRS) satellite shows that forest fires are raging nationwide especially in the Central, Western and Southern regions since the past week.The Indian Meteorological Department (IMD) anticipates heat wave conditions in isolated pockets over Madhya Pradesh, Vidarbha, north interior Karnataka, Telangana and Rayalaseema between March 30 and April 3. It forecast hot and humid conditions in Odisha, with the mercury likely to soar to 40°Celsius.IMD scientists say high temperatures and extreme dryness provide favourable conditions for a natural fire. Moreover, temperatures are soaring all across the country above normal and causing forest fires. However, “western disturbance induced rainfall and snowfall in the Northwest and a cyclonic circulation caused rainfall in Eastern India. They reduced the forest fire intensity in these two regions,” said a senior scientist at the IMD.Studies show that most forest fires in the country are of anthropogenic origin and therefore preventable.
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