Lucknow Municipal Corporation claims fogging done, residents ask when

Lucknow: As the temperature rises with each passing day, mosquito menace in the city is also rising proportionally. While Lucknow Municipal Corporation claims that the entire city has been covered under fogging once in March and the second round is currently on, residents say it doesn’t seem to have happened at all, looking at the growing number of mosquitoes around them.
This, when the technical advisory committee had instructed the authorities to conduct fogging during January. The committee was constituted on high court’s intervention following the dengue epidemic last year.
In a reality check, TOI found that in most areas of the city, including Indiragar, Munshipulia, Gomtinagar, Aliganj, Mahanagar, Alamnbagh, Niralanagar, Daliganj, Aashiana, Rajajipuram and Old City, people say they have not seen fogging being done even once in the past six months.
“We have not seen fogging being done in our area this year. The number of mosquitoes is increasing day by day. It is absolutely impossible to wear short clothes after sunset. If someday, by mistake, the windows are left open the house is filled with mosquitoes,” said Navya Gupta, a resident of Jankipuram.
While the corporation claims that 24 mini trucks and 60 cycles are being used for fogging, residents of congested localities say they have hardly ever seen fogging machines enter narrow lanes. “All the narrow lanes of our locality are left out whenever fogging is conducted. While no fogging has been done this year, last year, when we requested the workers to cover the bylanes, they said they couldn’t take the vehicle to narrow lanes,” said Siddhartha Sharma, a resident of Nakhas.
Even in the areas where residents have seen fogging been done once in a while, they say it hasn’t made much of a difference. “Once fogging was happening in my area but the vehicle did not even enter the lane. It stood at the turn and blew smoke from there. I don’t think the smoke even reached the end of the road,” said Nikhil Mehrotra, a resident of Vikasnagar.
However, LMC official P K Singh said, “Since fogging cannot be done when the temperature is too high, we have completed it in March. This year, it has been done in every nook and corner of the city, including all narrow lanes of old Lucknow,” he said.