the goan I network
PANAJI
At the meeting, Azgaonkar met with the departments of Forest, Animal Husbandry and Health on how to contain the spread of the disease that originates from the corpses of monkeys.
The main aim of the meeting, Azgaonkar said was to make sure any problems or shortfalls should be dealt with in a fast manner.
The three departments will work in creating awareness programmes and conduct vaccination drives in the affected areas including Patradevi and Vazri.
“Since the beginning of the season there have been 26 monkey deaths and three people died because of the disease they were affected. There is an urgent and immediate need to put in place contingency measures.”
“In such a case, the Forest department has to take the lead and if there are any shortfalls, they should come to me and get them cleared,” he said.
As a result of the fear of the spread of the disease, many people who were engaged in cashew plantations have also left their occupation and moved out of their villages. Azgaonkar said
those working in cashew plantations had stopped all work adding that it would end up being a problem for the state as a whole.
On the issue of the controversial vaccine, the tourism minister said it was entirely safe and urged people in the area to be vaccinated as soon as possible.
“There was doubt in the mind of the locals that the vaccine was not good. But with awareness camps and panchayat level meetings, we have convinced the people that there is no problem with it and they are now coming forward for vaccination. We need to scale this up to a higger level,” he said.
Says he did not target Lamanis
PANAJI: Sticking to his original comments, Tourism Minister Babu Azgaonkar on Monday clarified that he had never targetted the entire Lamani or Banjara community, but said that only those involved in illegal activities would be stopped.
“My main aim was to clamp down on drugs being sold on the beaches that have brought a bad image for the entire state,” he said.
He urged locals also to work with the police in identifying those involved in illegal activities including distributing drugs and harassing tourists. “To the locals, I would like to say keep an eye on everything around you for any illegal activities and inform the police about it,” he said.
Refusing claims that he would remove the entire community, Azgaonkar added that he didn’t have to apologise to the Banjara community as he hadn’t targeted them in the first place.
