Swarm Of Locusts Reaches Gurugram, Likely To Enter Delhi

A swarm of locusts, about 3 km in length, has hit Gurugram and it is likely to enter Delhi by Saturday evening or Sunday morning.

“They are flying across the city West to East due to the steady wind. They will most likely enter Delhi," said Amit Khatri, Gurugram Deputy Commissioner (DC).

The Gurugram administration is sounding sirens and blowing horns to make noises so that the locusts don’t settle on green vegetation and destroy them.

“Besides, we have been spraying chemicals through vehicle-mounted pump sets in rural areas,” Khatri said.

On Friday, Gurugram administration reportedly warned its residents about the attack, urging them to keep their windows shut as a precautionary measure. The administration also asked them to make clanging noise by beating utensils to repel the crop-eating insects.

#WATCH Haryana: Swarms of locusts create menace in different parts of Gurugram; Visuals from Sector-5, Palam Vihar pic.twitter.com/1P2Dyk90zR

— ANI (@ANI) June 27, 2020

The locust attack has ravaged parts of Uttar Pradesh, Rajasthan, Punjab and few other states for over a month.

Experts say that the present locust crisis that many Indian states are faced with is intense due to the younger population of the insect, swarms of which have entered the country from the north-west areas bordering Pakistan.

A young locust is far more dangerous for crops than a mature and older one. While the mature locusts cover shorter distances and focus more on breeding, the younger ones can fly 150 km in a day and devour more green vegetation.

Experts believe that the current locust invasion was part of the residue population that survived after February 17, 2020, in the deserts of Pakistan and Iran. After 1993, for the first time on May 22, 2019, large swarms of locusts invaded areas bordering Pakistan. Locust controlling units thought that they could finish them by the end of October 2019 but the invasion continued till early February 2020.

“On February 17, 2020, we either killed all the locusts or forced them to go across the border in Pakistan and Iran. We stopped our locust control measures and expected that Pakistan and Iran would take similar measures to eliminate them. But somehow, the residue population continued breeding and in April they attacked,” said Dr Rajesh Kumar, Plant Protection Officer, Jaisalmer.