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Drones, drums and DJs: How India is fighting worst locust attack in decades

When police sirens wailed in Madhya Pradesh's Panna area earlier this week, it wasn’t for chasing thieves or thugs but warding off a far deadlier creature—the locust, which can consume its own weight in fresh food every day.


Small wonder then that every high and low-tech method is being used to drive them away.

Authorities have armed themselves with aerial sprayers (15 brought from the UK) in Rajasthan, Gujarat, Punjab, MP and Maharashtra while drones have been deployed to sprinkle chemicals in inaccessible areas.


No stone has been left unturned by farmers either who are using desi fixes to ward off the pests. Drums, thalis and even mobile DJs used for wedding celebrations have been pressed to service. Loud sounds are one of the ways to scare off the insects that can wreck havoc on crops . In a clip posted by a UP police officer posted in Jhansi, Rahul Shrivastava , a vehicle fitted with loudspeakers -locally known as a ‘DJ vehicle’ and typically used for music in marriage processions - can be seen blaring loud music from its speakers.

In Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh, UP and Haryana, farmers have been advised to beat utensils. “In the event of a locust attack, farmers are advised to collectively beat loud drums, tin containers, utensils and use loudspeakers to prevent locusts from descending on farms and damaging crops," Suhas LY, district magistrate of Gautam Buddha Nagar district, said on Twitter.

India does have a fair bit of experience in combating locusts. Official records report eight “outbreaks” in India from 1812 to 1889, and a ninth one in 1896-1897. The five-year invasion from 1926 to 1931 was estimated, conservatively, to have caused damage of Rs 2 crore to crops alone, say records. This prompted setting up of a Central Locust Bureau in 1930 that later became the Locust Warning Organisation (LWO) in 1939 with its headquarters in Delhi and a substation in Karachi. LWO is responsible for monitoring and controlling the Desert Locust within a vast desert area of Rajasthan and in the states of Gujarat and Haryana.

But tracking the swarms has not always been easy. Locust technical officer Dr Harish Chandra, who was posted at Jaisalmer in 1961, writes in a book charting the 50- year history of the LWO released by UN’s Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO), about locating swarms in a jeep. “I had to run from dawn to dusk in a vehicle mounted with a wireless set so I could inform the officers camping at strategic points, with their pesticides and equipment, about the details of the swarms such as their size and colour, and the latitude/longitude location of their roosting sites.”

Sometimes there would be awkward situations where officers trying to kill locust fledglings faced resistance from local tribes who savoured them as food, he says. In Leh district, the locals resisted killing the insect for religious reasons. Deputy director (entomology) Dr J N Thakur recalls how in August 2006, villages along the India-China border in Demchok area, did not allow the spraying of pesticides. “Their plea was that these pests are also like our children; it is their right to develop in the environment suited for them. Asked about how to save the standing crops from insect damage, they replied that they will do some spiritual acts that will prevent the incidence of pests. The inhabitants of these valleys are mostly Buddhists. Similar cases came to our notice during the control operations in Zanskar Valley,” he writes.

Faced with the challenge, countries have tried to make the best of a bad situation with some creative ideas. In Pakistan's Okara district, farmers have turned it into a lucrative business by trapping and selling locusts to mills that use them as high-protein chicken feed. China, on the other hand, used ducks as “bio warfare” as ducks eat locusts. For a while, the Chinese considered sending their duck army to Pakistan, but scientists spiked the idea because of the arid conditions.

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