Click to play videoBirbhum: The Union Government says bird flu may be spreading to new areas as more birds are found dead in West Bengal but the state government has failed to confirm if it actually is bird flu.
However, West Bengal Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee has called for an emergency meeting to discuss speeding up the culling of chicken in the state.
Bird flu has spread to a few more districts of West Bengal after it was reported from the districts of Birbhum and South Dinajpur. Even the World Health Organisation has called it a more serious outbreak than the ones that took place earlier in Maharashtra and Manipur.
But it is tough to convince people on the ground that culling needs to be done and that too quickly.
Even after two days of culling operations in Birbhum, the toughest job for health officials is convincing locals that they have to let the birds be killed to prevent bird flu from spreading.
Margram in Khansama Para is the epicentre of bird flu outbreak in Birbhum district. Villagers of Margram have sent back a group of health officials who came to cull their birds.
And even in a place where hundreds and thousands of birds have died in the last few days, the local people have taken hardly any protection.
The villagers have been bringing birds for culling holding them with their bare hands, which is in sharp contrast to culling officials in protective suits.
Even those who have volunteered to help in the culling are not aware of basic precautions, handling infected birds with their bare hands and no protection and they blame the government for this.
"Officials are wearing protective gears but what about us," a villager Jan Nehara says.
Things could get worse in the state. The centre says more birds have died in other parts in Bengal, but the state government has not been able to confirm or deny if this is because of avian flu.
"No official report has come from the Government of West Bengal in this regards that in the new areas - Nadia, Bardhaman and 24 Parganas - there is a mortality of birds," Pradeep Kumar, Union Animal Husbandry Secretary, says.
And that could be the bigger problem as many infected chicken have yet to be culled.
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