Srinagar: The devastating and painful trend of cutting down of apple trees continues in South Kashmir’s Mehand village and this trend has not only baffled the locals but also left them in state of shock and fright.
After cutting down more than 350 apple trees during the intervening night of June 2 and 3, now miscreants struck again on Thursday in the orchards of same village and reportedly cut down more than 90 trees.
As reported yesterday, from past couple of days miscreants are chopping down high-breed apple trees in Mehand village of Anantnag prompting police to lodge an FIR against unidentified persons.
Locals told news agency KNT that as they visited their orchards during morning hours they were shocked to see branches of apple trees lying down.
“Who are these miscreants? They are heartless, ruthless and need to be severely. We are aghast and don’t know what to do,” they said.
“Over 350 apple trees were damaged earlier in the same village and some trees were cut in its adjacent Hati village. Now again these (I don’t have words for them) have damaged over 90 trees,” said an orchardist.
As people started assembling in large numbers, a police party rushed to the spot to assess the damage. They assured villagers of action and promised them the culprits will be exposed and punished.
“These are all young hybrid apple trees. We don’t know who is behind these acts. We will lose everything if this trend continues,” said a villager Abdul Rashid.
The villagers who had lost their apple trees from past couple of days are Abdul Rahim Rather, Abdul Rashid Rather, Abdul Rahim Bhat, Ghulam Muhammad Dar, Abdul Aziz Wagay and Muhammad Anwar Sofi.
A police official said that a case already stands registered at police station Sri Gufwara. “We are on it and will trace the culprits,” he said adding that cutting apple trees is a heinous crime.
– KNT
