STATE TIMES NEWS
DODA: Toddler among four family members and cattle charred to death after a hut in which they were living in a village Gadan of Tehsil Bhagwah in the Doda District caught fire in the intervening night of 29th February and 1st March.
The deceased have been identified as Abdul Rasheed son of Rusla Butt (55) his wife Fata Begum (50) his daughter-in law-Mubeena (22) and his seven months grand-daughter .
Atleast 20 cattle including 13 sheep, four bulls and three cows besides cocks and hens were also burnt alive in the devastating fire.
The incident came to light on Tuesday morning at about 4:30AM when villagers started coming out of their houses for morning prayers and noticed the house engulfed in huge flames and raised an alarm. They tried to douse the flames with water but were unable to control it as by then entire house made up of dry wood had caught fire.
The villagers said that the owner had dumped dry fodder adjoining his house for cattle which perhaps caught fire due to the unextinguished fire place resulting in the tragedy.
Gadan is far off village 25 km from Doda town connected with a kacha road and the house which caught fire is another 1km from the motorable road thereby could not get the help from fire tenders in time.
People of Gadan and adjoining area are up in arms against the administration and alleged that if administration would have reacted swiftly perhaps some lives could have been saved.
“The exact cause of fire has not been established yet as police is investigating the same. As of now we gave Rs 10,000 to the only surviving member of the family Nasir Ahmed and also provided a tent, five blankets and kitchen essentials from Red Cross Fund as instant help,” said DDC Doda Bhupinder Kumar adding that Tehsildar and Naib Tehsildar are camping there and he directed them to asses the losses so that relief could be provided to the affected family at the earliest. “We will provide them all the possible help under rule” he said. “Gadan is a far-off area and it takes at least three hours to reach there and moreever the house is located 1 Km away from the motorable road. So it’s practically impossible for fire tenders to reach there,” DDC said.