After swarms of locusts were spotted in two border villages of Punjab’s Fazilka district, State Agriculture Department sounded a high alert and neutralised the threat after a 12 hour long operation.
Emanating from Pakistan, the swarms of pests-three to four-km-long and one-km-wide, settled at the trees in these border villages on Sunday evening, officials said on Monday.
The alert was sounded on Sunday night after a big swarm of locust, spreading over three kms, had arrived in Roopnagar and Bareka villages of Fazilika district on late Sunday evening.
A joint operation involving the District Administration, Agriculture Department, Border Security Force (BSF), fire brigade, among others, was carried out under the supervision of Fazilka Deputy Commissioner Manpreet Singh.
Financial Commissioner (Development) Viswajeet Khanna had directed the State Agriculture Secretary Kahan Singh Pannu to chalk out an effective action-oriented strategy on the ground to combat the attack of locust swarms in the two villages.
He had also asked the Deputy Commissioner to take stock of the situation on the ground for meticulously planning and personally supervise the entire operation to ensure elimination of locust swarm, which has entered in these villages.
Subsequently, the DC held a meeting of all district-level stakeholders late on Sunday night to review the preparedness plans in this regard.
Meanwhile, Pannu also held a meeting with officials of Agriculture Department at 9 pm on Sunday and sounded a high alert.
He deputed all concerned officers on emergency duty and asked both the Agriculture Director and Joint Director to immediately rush to these vulnerable sites attacked by the locust in Fazilka district.
On reaching Abohar, the Director Agriculture held detailed deliberations with the officials at 5 am, and then took command of the joint operation involving BSF, fire brigade, departments of Agriculture and Horticulture, Punjab Agriculture University (PAU), civil and police administration of Fazilka district, besides the farmers, under the direct supervision of DC Fazilka.
Sufficient quantity of insecticide was provided to all teams. Boomer sprayers, tractor mounted high velocity sprayers and fire brigade vehicle were utilised to control the locust. The operation finally concluded successfully at 10 am on Monday with complete elimination of the locust swarm.
Notably, Capt Amarinder has already taken up the issue of attacks on crops by locust swarms in the neighbouring areas of southern Punjab bordering Rajasthan with the Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
He has urged the Prime Minister to direct the Union Ministry of External Affairs and the Indian
High Commission in Islamabad to immediately raise this matter with the Government of Pakistan, from where the pests were entering the Indian side.