Three hundred apple plants have been destroyed in a fire in an apple orchard in Dhapakhet, Guthichow Rural Municipality-3, Jumla. The fire broke out in the apple orchard of Hari Bahadur Bhandari of Guthichow Rural Municipality-5.

He is also the former chairman of Guthichow Rural Municipality. The apples in the orchard were blooming and turning white. This time, it was expected to bear fruit well, but the plants were destroyed due to the fire.

The orchard caught fire around 12 noon on Sunday. Bhandari said that the fire caused damage worth lakhs. It is not yet clear how the fire started. A team led by Dhalmudi Police Station In-charge Tara Bahadur Dangi reached the spot after the fire. The police and locals jointly brought the fire under control. 'The fire completely destroyed 300 fruit-bearing apple trees,' said Hari Bahadur, 'According to initial estimates, the damage is worth 900,000 rupees.'

The damage was to apples planted in an orchard spread over 2,000 acres. 'Years of hard work were destroyed by the fire,' said Bhandari, 'Disaster struck at a time when income was expected.' The fire was difficult to control due to the large amount of dry grass in the orchard. The police have said that an investigation into the incident is underway.

Spread over an area of ​​nearly 61,000 square meters, this orchard has 1,600 trees, including 900 local and 700 Fuji varieties of apples. In 2069, more than 1.2 million rupees were spent on fencing and infrastructure construction, and a total of 500,000 rupees have been invested in this orchard so far.