In South Dinajpur district, official sources said 2,000 chickens and ducks were culled.
According to Som, in Rampurhat block I and II, people brought hens, ducks and eggs and collected compensation slips at the rate of Rs.40 for a big hen or duck and Rs.30 for a smaller one.
In New Delhi, Pradip Kumar, secretary of the department of animal husbandry, ministry of agriculture, said: “West Bengal started the culling operation early Wednesday and we have asked some neighbouring states like Bihar and Jharkhand to be on alert.”
Kumar told reporters that in the last 10 days, over 55,000 poultry had died in West Bengal. Of the total deaths, Birbhum district alone account for 54,402 deaths.
India confirmed an outbreak of bird flu in two districts of West Bengal Tuesday and mounted efforts to contain it.
Kumar said at least 1,000 poultry birds in three villages of Khargaon block in the adjoining district of Murshidabad and 266 poultry birds in a farm in South Dinajpur had also died.
“Samples of dead birds have been collected from Murshidabad district for testing at the High Security Animal Disease Laboratory of Bhopal. Intensive surveillance in adjoining areas is continuing for any unusual mortality of poultry bird,” he added.
According to health ministry officials, some northeastern states were asked to be on alert as well.
“Looking at the July 2007 bird flu outbreak in Manipur, northeastern states have been asked to be on alert,” said a top health ministry official.
The border with Bangladesh has been sealed in the affected areas, especially South Dinajpur which shares a long border with the neighbouring country.
Officials said in worst affected Birbhum district about 55 teams were formed to both inform the people about bird flu and identify the sick birds.
Control rooms were also being set up in each block of the affected regions under the supervision of West Bengal’s Additional Chief Secretary Kalyan Bagchi and Animal Resource Development director Dilip Das.
Clad in safety masks, gloves, the rapid response teams were seen culling birds in the two affected districts.
The process of culling was slow and entirely unorganised, those involved in the operation said.
“We started the culling operation at around 10 a.m. At least 350,000 birds would be culled in Birbhum district and about 28,000 in South Dinajpur district,” West Bengal Animal Resource Minister Anisur Rahman told IANS earlier.
“Our workers have fanned out in the five affected blocks and one municipal area of Birbhum to kill poultry birds in an area of about three km radius. In South Dinajpur’s Balurghat area, the culling would take place in an area with five km radius,” Rahman said.
“We have already disbursed Rs.10 million for (compensation to poultry owners in) Birbhum district and a proportionate amount for South Dinajpur where the affected area is not as large.”
As the news about the deadly avian flu spread, prices and demand for chickens nose-dived in Kolkata markets.
A market in Jadavpur area in south Kolkata was selling chicken for Rs.40 per kg, less than half the normal price range of Rs.80-100, but there were no takers for the favourite meat of the Bengalis.
“There is surely a panic. We have hardly sold anything since morning,” a shop owner at Poddarnagar market of Jadavpur said.
“We will not have chicken till the danger is over. We can have mutton and more fish now. In fact, we have stopped having eggs too,” said Sonali Das, a homemaker in Lake Gardens in south Kolkata.
West Bengal Poultry Welfare Association assistant secretary Najrul Islam told IANS that the owners would hold a press conference with the concerned minister (Rahman) to make the people aware and dispel unfounded apprehensions.
“We are also taking care so that the infection could not spread further. We are also providing medication and trying to disinfect the poultry farms,” Islam said.
More than 35,000 birds died in the past two weeks in the state – mostly in Birbhum district’s Margram village area, about 280 km from here. There were deaths in Balurghat area of South Dinajpur district, about 400 km from here.
Reports of poultry bird deaths also poured in from Murshidabad district, adjoining Birbhum.
On Tuesday, a door-to-door inspection of people with suspected symptoms of avian influenza began in Margram village, the epicentre of the epidemic.
“Our health workers have been fanning out in the entire area,” Birbhum chief medical officer Sunil Kumar Bhowmick said.
Selling and buying chicken has already been banned in Rampurhat I and II and the Rampurhat municipal area in Birbhum.
Meanwhile, Orissa was colleting samples of dead migratory birds from the Chilika Lake.
As a precautionary measure, Jharkhand banned the import of chicken from West Bengal and constituted a three-member team to keep a tab on the bird flu situation in the state.
The state government was particularly worried about three border districts of Dumka, Pakur and Sahebganj, which abut Birbhum district of West Bengal, an official said. The team would collect samples for testing from the area and ensure that the ban on chicken from West Bengal is implemented.
West Bengal is the fifth state in the country to have been struck by an outbreak of H5N1 bird flu since the first one in Maharashtra in February 2006. Gujarat, Madhya Pradesh and Manipur were also affected in the past.
In Nandurbar district of Maharashtra in 2006, about a million birds were culled after the presence of the H5N1 virus was confirmed.
The virus causes a type of influenza in birds that is highly contagious and can be deadly. It does not usually infect people unless they come in close contact with infected birds or contaminated surfaces.
Avian influenza experts said speed in extinguishing the outbreak is crucial. The state government will need to prevent the movement of poultry out of the affected area.