Poultry culled , wild birds spared

Statesman News Service

MALDA, Jan. 25: Though the Central authority for disease control and prevention has directed the departments concerned to cull poultry as well as other birds in the avian flu affected areas, no initiative has been taken to kill birds, other than poultry in Chanchal block in the northern part of Malda, owing to alleged lack of coordination between the animal resources development (ARD) and forest department. “ How is it possible to kill the birds that are free in the wild? The ARD is responsible for killing hens, ducks and other domestic birds like pigeons, and that too with the help of locals, most of whom rear them as pets”, said Mr N K Shit, deputy director, Malda animal resources development. According to the Malda ARD deputy director, yesterday, the department culled only 350 chickens out of targeted figure 80,000 in the avian flu affected zone due to villagers’ resistance.Villagers not only resisted and assaulted the ARD officials, but also claimed that they would hand over their chickens to them only when culling operation team would be able to kill others birds that fly around in the area. The locals resisted the culling operation last evening to demand the present market price for their chickens in comparison with the poor compensation fixed by the government. “It is an up hill task to cull domestic chickens due to villagers’ resistance. How do we kill other fling birds now? We don't know the role of forest department. It can cull others flying birds”, Mr Shit said.“The system should be more scientific for culling operation”, he said. Administrative official (Malda SDO) claimed that there is no lack of coordination because the forest department officials attended all bird flu control meeting. “Officially there is a coordination but there was no coordination in practical field”, a veterinary doctor said.In the meantime, hundreds of pigeons died at Kazigram village very close to English Bazaar town in last few days. The Kazigram panchayat chief today informed the matter to the administrative officials for collecting its blood samples for laboratory tests in Bhopal.He received death reports of hundreds of hens and pigeons died in two villages over the past few days.The Malda SDO Ms Arunima De said that she got information about unnatural death of 50 pigeons at Kazigram village in English Bazaar block. She asked ARD officials to examine the dead birds for collecting blood samples and confirm the disease. In Malda, though the ARD officials claim that they have sealed the Indo-Bangladesh border with the help of border security forces and restricted to carry birds from Bangladesh but there is no way to restrict over the flying birds. Interestingly, pigeons fly over the border with their nature and many of them fly to Bangladesh and fly back to their homes in Indian side. The matter was also discussed partly today at the avian flu control meeting. Although there was a fresh death report of chicken in Harishchandrapur II block and the Chanchal SDO Mr. Debasish Sarkar asked the ARD officials to collect blood samples for more confirmation, the deputy director Mr. N K Shit said: “ We did not collect blood. But we are keeping a close watch on the situation. We will collect blood samples based on a report of mass mortality rate and flu like symptoms will be detected”.