Kerala Forest Minister orders probe into forest fires in Silent Valley

Thiruvananthapuram, March 16 Kerala Forest Minister A.K.Saseendran on Wednesday ordered a probe into the forest fires that broke out in ecologically fragile areas in the buffer zone of the Silent Valley and Walayar in Palakkad district.

According to the Forest department, the fire that was spotted on Saturday, has been doused but not before it destroyed around 10 hectares of forests each at the Silent Valley and Walayar area.

In the past few days, the mercury has been rising and especially districts like Palakkad have been the hottest but despite it, Vinod Kumar the forest official in the Silent Valley area expressed his doubts that if this was a man made event.

"Everything points out to that this was a man made event and we have no clue why this has happened," said Kumar.

Silent Valley National park is one of the least undisturbed tracts of South Western Ghats mountain rain forests and tropical evergreen forest in India.

It has some rare species of flora and fauna. This area was explored in 1847 by the botanist Robert Wight.

It is located in the border of Mannarkkad taluk of Palakkad district, Nilambur Taluk of Malappuram district, Kerala, and Nilgiris district of Tamil Nadu.

Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor