Mosquito repellant and aerosol manufacturers bribe municipal authorities

by Special Correspondent
December 17, 2011

http://www.weeklyblitz.net/1992/mosquito-repellant-and-aerosol-manufacturers

Manufacturers of mosquito repellant coils and aerosol sprays regularly bribe municipal authorities and City Corporations in Bangladesh in order to make sure that no initiate is taken by these authorities in destroying the breeding grounds of mosquitoes. Under such arrangement, only authorities of Dhaka City Corporation receive Taka 10-15 million per month. Being bribed by these unscrupulous elements, authorities of city corporations and municipal corporations are not only refraining from any drastic drive against mosquitoes, it also sells the imported anti-mosquito medicines to the black market just mostly spraying water to simply cheat the public eyes. In some cases, toilet cleaning fluids such as Harpic are mixed with plain water and sprayed in various areas in the name of anti-mosquito medicines. City and municipal corporations spend a few hundred million Taka every year for buying such medicines through local suppliers. On condition of anonymity, a source inside Dhaka City Corporation [DCC] told Weekly Blitz that, as soon as such anti-mosquito medicines are purchased by DCC, it directly goes into black market or in most cases "sold back" to the supplier itself thus giving it the opportunity of selling the same medicine to the authorities concerned on repeated times. The ministry concerned is also aware of such massive corruption and irregularity inside the city and municipal corporations, but maintain tight lip as most of the top brasses in the ministry also received a stake of such bribe money.

On an average, the monthly sale of mosquito repellants in Bangladesh crosses 600-650 million, while the average sale of aerosol sprays are above 50-60 million. The unscrupulous manufacturers of mosquito repellants and aerosol sprays ensure such hugely profitable business by ensuring that none of the city corporations or municipal corporation authority initiates any drastic drive in destroying the breeding grounds of mosquitoes. It is learnt from dependable sources that, such hidden connection between city corporations or municipal corporation authority continues even in broad-daylight, as most of the top brasses in these institutions continue to get a stake of the monthly bribe paid by the manufacturers of mosquito repellants and aerosol sprays.

Currently Bayer and ACI are dominating the business of selling mosquito and insect killer aerosol sprays. At the same time, Reckit & Collman, ACI and some other local companies are cashing huge profit every month by selling mosquito repellants, which is popularly known in Bangladesh as "Mosquito Coil". In district towns, small factories of mosquito coils are established either with local or Indian machinery, though few years back, most of the machinery for such factories were being imported from China.

The business of import and distribution of plug-in mosquito repellants and liquids are also increasing in Bangladesh. Most of such items are imported from India and China.

Bangladesh though was fully able to eliminate malaria few years back, in recent years, malaria has started returning and in past three years, at least a few hundred people were already detected to be affected by malaria. In addition, the number of Dengue patients is continuing to increase in alarming level.

It may be mentioned here that, smoke of mosquito repellant coil is extremely hazardous to human health while aerosol sprays damage the ozone layer. In most of the countries, burning of mosquito repellant coils inside homes is forbidden, while in Bangladesh, mosquito repellant coils are not only used inside domestic and commercial buildings, it also contain extremely hazardous chemicals like DDT.

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