Indian States bordering Bangladesh have become vulnerable to bird flu with the country continuing to be a breeding ground for the disease, officials here said on Monday. "Forty-seven of the 64 districts in Bangladesh are hit by bird flu. With the authorities failing to control the disease and no efforts at checking smuggling of poultry and poultry products, bordering Indian States are becoming vulnerable to avian influenza,' said Ashish Roy Burman, Director of Tripura's Animal Resource Development (ARD) Department.

The Tripura Government has asked the External Affairs Ministry to take up the issue of unchecked poultry movement from Bangladesh to bordering villages of Tripura, where incidents of bird flu were increasing. State Animal Resource Development Minister Aghor Debbarma here today said there were reports of poultry movement from across the border and since most of the area in Bangladesh had already been affected by the H5N1 virus, it increased the risk of flu spread.

The Tripura Government has initiated a comprehensive proposal for the protection of wildlife with the publication of a survey report, indicating the increase of elephant population, while the concerned department has been asked to mobilise forest dwelling communities for the natural resource conservation process. Talking to UNI here today, state Forest Minister Jitendra Choudhury said the population of wild elephants had increased substantially over the past six years and a total of 59 pachyderms, including 10 babies, were spotted during the latest census, which had only been 40 in 2002.

All schools across the country will have toilet facilities by the year end, Union Rural Development Minister Raghuvansh Prasad Singh said on Thursday. While Sikkim, Puducherry, Mizoram and Haryana have already achieved this target, Gujarat, Karnataka, Maharashtra, Tamil Nadu, Tripura, Jharkhand, Kerala, Madhya Pradesh, West Bengal and Rajasthan will do so by July. The remaining States that include Arunachal Pradesh, Andhra Pradesh, Assam, Bihar, Chhattisgarh, Goa, Punjab, Orissa, Uttar Pradesh and Uttarakhand will be able to cover all schools by November.

The two-day North Eastern Council (NEC) plenary has approved the Vision 2020 to restore the NE region to a position of national economic eminence by the next eight to ten years. After hectic discussion among member States of the NEC in the two-day plenary that commenced here on Monday, DoNER Minister Mani Shankar Aiyer, all Governors and Chief Ministers of the region states signed the Vision-2020 document on Tuesday.

Perched on Killa Hill, Tobakla, a remote tribal hamlet in Tripura's South district, now shines in the dark with a non-conventional solar power plant supplying energy under the Rajiv Gandhi Grameen Vaidyutikaran Yojana. A septuagenarian, Bikram Singh Jamatiya is a delighted man today. "My village is remote which can be approached only on foot. We lived in darkness at night. Now it is different,' he told a group of visiting journalists. "Earlier, we saw electric lights only when we went to Udaipur, the district town, which is about 25 km from the village,' he said.

With the detection of bird flu in Bishalgarh, the Shipaijala Sanctuary is taking all measures to prevent any outbreak of the H5N1 virus. As a preventative step the authorities have sent blood samples of birds from the sanctuary yesterday for testing. Culling operation was on in full swing and all birds within a periphery of 5 KM of the affected area were being culled, except those in the sanctuary. According to an Animal Resource Department official, the Shipaijala Sanctuary inmates do not fall under the culling operation as it has many rare species.

About 19 people died of Malaria and more than 100 people were admitted to different hospitals in the last 14 days in Tripura, official sources today said. Mungiakami block under Taliamura subdivison of West Tripura district was the worst affected with nine deaths reported from there so far. However, a health worker in Teliamura primary health centre said there was nothing to worry as the centre has adequate medicines to cope up with the situation.

Culling began today in bird-flu hit Nadilag and its surrounding areas of West Tripura district as the state government said neighbouring Bangladesh could be the possible source of infection. As the H5N1 virus was confirmed in blood samples of dead birds from Nadilag village by the High Security Animal Diseases Laboratory in Bhopal, the authorities started the operation, setting a target of culling 20,000 chicken in eight gram panchayat areas surrounding Nadilag in four days.

AGARTALA: The Rapid Response Teams (RRTs) have launched full-scale culling at Ladilak and its adjacent villages in Bishalgarh subdivision in Tripura today. As of now, over 1,000 chicks and ducks were culled at 11 designated places across the subdivision, said Ashudev Das, SDM (Bishalgarh) here on Sunday. He said that officials of administration and ARDD are monitoring the culling operation.