LUCKNOW: The Uttar Pradesh government is set to include attacks by bees and wildlife animals like jackals and foxes in the category of state-notified disasters.
Attacks by over half a dozen animals, including tiger, leopard, elephant and bear, would be included in the list of attacks to be notified as state disasters.
Notably, there have been a couple of incidents of bee attacks have come to the fore in the state last week. As per the sources, the Relief Commissioner's office has already floated a proposal to this effect after getting a nod by a state executive committee of the State Disaster Relief Fund committee, chaired by Chief Secretary Manoj Kumar Singh, recently.
“The proposal has now been forwarded to the state government for a final decision. Once notified, victims will be entitled to get financial relief under disaster relief provisions,” said a senior official.
Once notified, in the event of human fatality caused by such attacks, the dependents of the deceased would get a financial relief of Rs 4 lakh, while the injured would receive free treatment at government hospitals.
Last week, several incidents of bee attacks, including one in which 11 people, among them two IAS officers, were injured near the Buddhist caves in the forest of Deogarh.
The officers got badly injured by a swarm of honey bees when they were on a district visit to review development projects. They had to be rushed to the hospital in critical condition.
Similarly, in Mirzapur, a team of 54 trainee forest officials were attacked by honey bees during one of their visits to the forest. While 16 got badly injured, four were referred to the trauma centre in Lucknow in critical condition.
In another incident reported from Barabanki, one person died after being attacked. According to the available information, attacks by jackals, foxes, and bees are proposed to be classified under man-animal conflict, one of the 11 categories recognised as state disasters.