The report said: "Dabur has been rearing queen bees, using such modern techniques as artificial insemination, at its apiculture research centre at Jugedi, Chitwan. ... Dabur has been providing queen, bees and boxes as a package to the farmers, again with buy-back guarantee for the product – honey, wax, propolis, pollen and royal jelly." So far, so good. However, in a later report in the same website, Vol. 20, No. 43, May 11 - 17, 2001, Akshay Sharma described the activities of the Dabur Apiculture Centre, Nepal, which said among other things: "The apiculture center has a facility of producing quality young mated queen bees under strict supervision of experts. The center can produce 5,000 queen bees every month, which are exported to India, United Kingdom and Poland, among other places". Now, that rattled. Can bees, queen bees and bee colonies be imported into India? Were there no restrictions, or did the Dabur Centre get permission to export live bee material from Nepal to India? If that was the case, which was the Indian government authorized organization to regulate such import and undertake quarantine checks in India? Being a layman and not in touch with the latest developments and goings on in the country, I presumed that the All India Coordinated Project on Honey bee Research and Training was aware of this matter and was perhaps checking such imports.
My presumption was wrong! The information on the meeting of the Central Government officials in January 2006 clearly indicates that import of honey bees (queen bees included) into India is not yet allowed. Also, the All India Coordinated Project on Honey bee Research and Training doesn't figure at all, in the decision making process of the Government of India in matters related to beekeeping development!