Baramulla: A cowshed cum food grains store worth thousands of rupees gutted when fire broke out in the cowshed at Zandafaran village of Naravaw area in north Kashmir’s Baramulla on Sunday late afternoon.

Witness said that fire broke out in cowshed cum food-grain store due to short circuit in electric wires of HT-line passing by the cowshed of Mohammad Yousuf Malik of Zandfaran village near Government Middle School Zandafaran.

The victim is father in law of senior Journalist Fayaz Bukhari who lost foodgrains, grass and other winter related items worth thousands of rupees as the cowshed burnt completely down and food grain worth thousands of rupees were reduced to ashes.

“Suddenly we saw flames erupted from the cowshed after there was shortcut in HT-Line passing by the cowshed. We rushed to douse the flames but failed to control the fire. Later, more locals from the village joined us in fire fighting operation but less availability of water till fire tender reached from Baramulla, the entire cowshed was gutted,” said Ghulam Mohi-ud-din Malik.

Fire was extinguished by the fire service personnel and police, CRPF also reached on the spot to put off the fire.

People of the Sheeri Narwav area which is comprising of 40 villages have been demanding fire station from last 10 years from several years but successive regimes failed to provide the fire station to the huge area where incidents of fire often cause massive destruction due to non-availability of fire tenders but nothing was done so far