Prez House gets 74 notices from NDMC

The NDMC has issued 74 notices this month to Rashtrapati Bhavan after finding heavy breeding of mosquitoes in several spots on its premises.

Following this, special teams were formed to check mosquito breeding on the sprawling estate, which also houses Rashtrapati Bhavan staff and their families.

Most of the mosquito breeding grounds were identified near the quarters of Class IV employees, according to a senior New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC) official.

“The overhead tanks near the quarters of class IV employees were found uncovered. These tanks were found to be breeding grounds of mosquitoes. Notices have been issued repeatedly to different departments so that the condition is improved. Ongoing construction and large amounts of discarded items were the other triggers behind heavy breeding of mosquitoes,” said a senior NDMC official.

On Monday, four four-member teams were constituted to review mosquitogenic conditions in different pockets of Rashtrapati Bhavan campus. Cases of dengue have surfaced in Rashtrapati Bhavan in the last few weeks, an official said.

Each team will have members from the sanitation, Central Public Works Department (CPWD), horticulture and NDMC’s vector-borne disease management cell, the official said.

The council issued another challan to the All India Institute of Medical Sciences (AIIMS) after it was found that there was heavy mosquito breeding there. Deccan Herald recently reported the NDMC had issued three challans to the AIIMS, three to Safdarjung, two to
Ram Manohar Lohia (RML) Hospital and one to Lady Hardinge Hospital.

Officials of the National Vector Borne Disease Control Programme last weekend visited the four hospitals to see if steps are being taken to improve the situation. The NDMC has now issued advisories to all embassies after some of these reported mosquitogenic conditions on their premises.

“The Embassy of Pakistan has given us permission to conduct intensive checks in their premises,” said another NDMC official. The council had found heavy mosquito breeding conditions at the embassies of Ghana, Ethiopia, Singapore, Malaysia, Bhutan, Ethiopia and the Czech Republic.

The NDMC Health Department has also sought help from the CPWD to help reduce mosquitogenic conditions. “The civil engineering department also needs to be involved. Otherwise, our hands are tied in controlling mosquitogenic conditions,” said an NDMC inspector. The council has issued 3,215 notices to households and institutions and 137 challans till now. With dengue cases at an all-time high in the past five years, the council is trying to increase community participation to curb them.