The Hindu : National : India seeks information from Bangladesh

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India seeks information from Bangladesh

Gargi Parsai

NEW DELHI: India has requested Bangladesh to share with it the ‘gene sequencing’ of the virus strain that has hit its poultry since February. The neighbouring country is reported to have notified bird flu in 30 of its 64 districts since February. The country has culled 3.37 lakh poultry birds so far, government sources said.

The sources indicated that the Indian High Commission in Bangladesh had been informed that one more district (Khulna), about 140 km from Dhaka, had been notified on Thursday as affected by bird flu. The neighbouring country is reported to have stepped up its vigil on the India border and taken steps to stop cross-border movement of poultry.

In India, with 13 districts hit by bird flu in West Bengal, the Centre has asked the railways to check movement of poultry from the State to adjoining States. So far 25.16 lakh birds have been culled in the affected districts against a target of 28 lakh poultry that are to be stamped out to contain the infection. All the 21 human samples had tested negative.

Union Animal Husbandry Secretary Pradeep Kumar said on Thursday that the Centre had not received any reports of unusual poultry deaths from Bareily in Uttar Pradesh.

There are reports of death of about 500 to 600 poultry birds in Bhiwani in Haryana on Thursday, but the State government maintains that this mortality was not due to avian influenza.

“The State has communicated to us that they got the blood samples from the dead birds tested at an agriculture university and found that it tested negative for avian influenza. But we have asked them to send samples to the High Security Animal Disease Laboratory in Bhopal for a conformation,” he said.

Relief package

Dr. Kumar said the government was contemplating two types of relief packages. One would be for the small, backyard poultry farmers who had lost their source of income. The other would be for the poultry industry, whose representatives met Union Agriculture Minister Sharad Pawar on Wednesday and sought several loan/interest concessions and subsidy on maize and soybean.

He expected the culling operation to be completed in West Bengal in two weeks. This will be followed by mopping and disinfection of the infected areas.

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