{"id":84408,"date":"2018-12-26T15:42:38","date_gmt":"2018-12-26T22:42:38","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=84408"},"modified":"2018-12-26T15:42:38","modified_gmt":"2018-12-26T22:42:38","slug":"at-rs-200-kg-rat-meat-a-prized-delicacy-in-this-eastern-indian-village","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2018\/12\/26\/at-rs-200-kg-rat-meat-a-prized-delicacy-in-this-eastern-indian-village\/","title":{"rendered":"At Rs 200\/kg, rat meat a prized delicacy in this Eastern Indian village"},"content":{"rendered":"
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Courtesy NewsIn.Asia<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n

Kumarikata, (Assam India), December 27 (AFP): Freshly-caught rat is at the top of the holiday menu for crowds flocking to a market in this northeastern state that specializes in rodents from local fields.<\/p><\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n

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Destined to be boiled, skinned and then cooked in a spicy gravy, rat is more popular than chicken and pork with customers at the Sunday market in the village of Kumarikata in\u00a0Assam.<\/p>\n

\"At<\/div>\n

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Shoppers buy hundreds of freshly caught and skinned\u00a0rats\u00a0that local farmers say are hunted to avoid damage to their fields in the state which borders Bhutan. The ready-roasted kind also goes down well.<\/p>\n

Rat has become a valuable source of income for the tribal people who struggle to make ends meet working in\u00a0Assam\u2019s famed tea gardens.<\/p>\n

In the winter months when tea picking slumbers, the tribals\u00a0go to rice paddies to trap\u00a0rats\u00a0for the market.<\/p>\n

A kilogram of rat meat, which is considered a delicacy, sells for about Rs 200\u00a0\u2014 as much as for chicken and pork.<\/p>\n

Farmers say the region has seen growing numbers of\u00a0rats\u00a0in recent years.<\/p>\n

We put traps in the fields as the\u00a0rats\u00a0eat people\u2019s paddy,\u201d Samba Soren, a rat vendor at Kumarikatan, said.<\/p>\n

The vendors have to work at night to make sure other predators do not get to the dead\u00a0rats\u00a0first. Some of the rodents are hunted at night during the harvesting season with traps made from bamboo.<\/p>\n

The traps are placed at the entrance of the rat-holes in the evening and the rodents are caught as they come out to scavenge.<\/p>\n

The rodents are hunted at night during the harvesting season with traps made from bamboo.<\/p>\n

The traps are placed at the entrance of the rat-holes in the evening and the rodents are caught as they come out to scavenge.<\/p>\n

The vendors have to work at night to make sure other predators do not get to the dead\u00a0rats\u00a0first. Some of the\u00a0rats\u00a0weigh more than a kilogram\u00a0and the market traders say they get between 10 and 20 kilograms a night.<\/p>\n

(The featured image at the top shows freshly caught rats being sold in this Assamese village bordering Bhutan.\u00a0Photo: AFP)<\/em><\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Courtesy NewsIn.Asia Kumarikata, (Assam India), December 27 (AFP): Freshly-caught rat is at the top of the holiday menu for crowds flocking to a market in this northeastern state that specializes in rodents from local fields. Destined to be boiled, skinned and then cooked in a spicy gravy, rat is more popular than chicken and pork […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[12],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-84408","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-forum"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=84408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/84408\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=84408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=84408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=84408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}