Even after controlling Howrah Municipal Corporation (HMC) for over two decades, the CPI-M led board has failed to stop pollution created by industries in most of its wards.

The Left Front government may claim to give equal importance to both industrialisation and agriculture, but nearly 30,000 villagers of 20 villages in Uluberia do not believe them. For they have to incur huge financial losses every year as their crops are damaged by contaminated water used for irrigation. The water they use comes from the Hangar canal, which they say has become contaminated with poisonous residue, left over by "illegal" liquor factories.

A pull of the neck and then a twist is all that is needed to bring silent death to a hen or a duck. In scientific terms, the bird

It is ironical that bird flu should deal a crippling blow to the West Bengal countryside shortly after the Government of India declared that the country was free from the scourge.