Bamboo fruits which rats feed on

Aizawl, Nov. 23: Scarred by the curse of famine once, Mizoram is losing sleep over rodent sightings in a swathe of verdant paddy fields in and around Khawzawl town.

The rapidly multiplying army of rodents, nourished by flowering bamboo groves, has fuelled fears of a famine like the one that ravaged the state in the early sixties and led to a 20-year spell of insurgency in the region?s tiniest state. ?Bamboo plants have begun flowering and these rodents are feeding on them. The rodents will reproduce faster as the season progresses. We are doomed,? said Lalchhawnkima, a farmer in Chawngtlai.

Khawzawl, on the northeastern fringes of Mizoram, is no stranger to rodent invasions, but the scale of reproduction seems to have increased manifold this year. ?Every year, a part of our harvest is consumed by these rats, but it has never been so alarming as this year. Several paddy fields have been devoured overnight,? Lalbiakmawia, another farmer from Chawngtlai, said. The village is 3 km from Khawzawl town.

The arrival of locusts, bugs, and leaf-folder insects has added to the sense of despondency.

Ngopa, Mamit, Champhai and several villages in Lunglei district are in the grip of this pest invasion. Thangnang, a bug that Mizos see as a harbinger of mautam (famine), has also been sighted.

The rare phenomenon of bamboo flowering is worrying, but multiplication of rodents is worse. Our agriculture-based economy will collapse if the state does not combat the menace immediately,? said Thanbika, president of the Chawngtlai Village Council.

James Lalsiamliana, assistant plant protection officer in the agriculture department, confirmed that rodents were damaging crops.

C. Rokhuma, a mautam expert, warned the Zoramthanga government against taking the threat of famine lightly. ?Rodent multiplication will have serious consequences owing to the government?s faulty policy. They told me that rewarding anyone who killed a rat was an outdated policy and that more scientific strategies would be employed. But the question is will these technologies reach the remote villages of the state in time??