PARBAT, April 25: Parbat, the district in Gandaki Province, continues to report incidents of forest fire since the last week of March. The wildfires so far destroyed 1,400 hectares of forest area. 

Assistant Forest Officer Ram Bahadur BK, Division Forest Office, Parbat, said the fire destroyed forest area spreading to 1416.6 hectares so far.  The first incidents of forest fire were reported from the Deurali community forest at Jaljala rural municipality-1 and Simlatechaur community forest at Jaljala-5. Till Wednesday, 70 community and national forests were affected by bushfires.

It is said that there are more cases of wildfires this year as compared to last year.

The Civil Code of Nepal has defined the act of causing a forest fire as a criminal offense. Though the Forest Act, 2049 BS (1993) and the National Parks and Wildlife Conservation Act, 2029 BS (1973) have provisioned a jail sentence and fine for causing the forest fire, officials complain that the legal provisions against it are yet to be implemented in the district.

The forest area in the district covers 27,640 (51 percent) of its total land 54,210 hectares.

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