The government is going to impose a 22-day ban on catching, selling, hoarding and transporting of hilsa from October 14 to November 4 to protect safe spawning of the fish during its peak breeding period.

The decision was taken in the meeting of Task Force held today. Rawnak Mahmud, secretary of Fisheries and Livestock ministry chaired the meeting.

The government imposed the ban in around 7,000 square kilometre area of rivers in 27 districts which were earmarked as the breeding ground of hilsa, according to the fisheries and livestock ministry.

Apart from rivers of those districts, all coastal areas and estuaries will be under the purview of the ban. Drives will be conducted to tackle catching, selling, hoarding and transporting of hilsa.

Shoals of mother hilsa start swimming upstream from the sea towards the river weeks before the full moon in October (Ashwin in Bengali calendar) and they return to the sea after spawning.