National
Woman dies as fire guts nearly 300 houses, sheds
A woman died and nearly 300 houses and sheds were destroyed in separate incidents of fire in various parts of the country in the past 24 hours, destroying properties worth million of rupees. Fire also damaged hectares of forest land in the country.Post District Bureau
A woman died and nearly 300 houses and sheds were destroyed in separate incidents of fire in various parts of the country in the past 24 hours, destroying properties worth million of rupees. Fire also damaged hectares of forest land in the country.
Kamal Dhimal, 42, of Itahari-3 in Morang district succumbed to burn injuries on Saturday. The victim sustained burn injuries when her house caught fire with a cigarette butt on Friday night. She breathed her last at Dharan-based BP Koirala Institute of Health Sciences, police said. In a separate incident, five houses were destroyed in a fire triggered by a short-circuit at Sidraha-1 in the district.
In Sindhuli, 42 houses and 16 animal sheds were gutted on Saturday when a massive fire broke out in a clustered Dalit settlement of Bhuwaneshwori. The inferno, which was still raging until the evening, destroyed a school building and killing scores of cattle.
Hundreds of security personnel were working tirelessly to douse the fire but to no avail. Chief District Officer Tara Bahadur Karki said it was very difficult to control the fire due to strong winds. The fire also destroyed forests in Ranikhola and Kirante in the district.
In Sunsari, a raging fire destroyed 65 houses and sheds at Bhokraha-9 on Saturday. There was huge damage in the inferno as the victims could not salvage their belongings, said police. The security personnel and the locals doused the fire with the help of fire engines that arrived from Itahari, Biratnagar and Inaruwa, in the evening.
In Banke, fire gutted 84 houses in three villages. According to the local administration, 61 houses in Kalafata, 18 houses in Holiya Village and five in Kusum were destroyed by the fire.
There were also reports of loss of properties and human injuries in fire in Rautahat, Palpa.
Earlier on Friday evening, two houses were engulfed in fire at Sisneri-5 in Okhaldhunga, destroying properties worth around Rs 1.1 million. The houses belonged to Hasta Bahadur Rai and Dipak Rai, police said.
Meanwhile, the district natural disaster rescue committee distributed reliefs to the fire victims at Kushahawa-1 and 2 in Kapilvastu on Saturday.
The committee provided Rs5,000 each to 67 households and Rs2,000 each to 15 families who were partially affected by the fire. A massive fire had destroyed 86 houses and 39 sheds in the settlement on Friday.
(With inputs from our local correspondents)