KODAIKANAL: More than 50 per cent of women and children in Poolathur village of Dindigul district have sores and wounds caused by lice on Indian gaurs. The victims suffered injuries when the lice, attached to plants when the gaurs raided the farmland recently, attacked them.

With no hospital around, the villagers depend on the Government Hospital in Batlagundu, 30 km away. Inadequate transport facility has turned the situation from bad to worse. Infected patients have to trek a 7-km stretch on the hill to reach Kumbarayiur junction to catch buses to reach Batlagundu.

"If we worked for even an hour in a farm which the gaurs frequent, we get a continuous itching sensation on the body, particularly around waist, legs and hands. It turns to sore and starts bleeding," the villagers said. They want the district administration to conduct a free medical camp to treat the affected people.

Solar fence

A solar electric fence at an estimated cost of Rs.8 lakh will be erected shortly along Reserve Forests near Poolathur to prevent entry of the Indian Gaur that invade and destroy standing crops on patta land, said L. Nathan, District Forest Officer, Kodaikanal Range.

Addressing farmers at Poolathur on Saturday, he said the Forest Department had submitted a proposal for Rs.22 lakh to the State Government for erecting the fence.

To begin with, a five-km stretch would be erected. Tender for the work would be floated next week, he said.

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