The interrelationship of latency period in viral infection and overall infection process in host community are of critical importance in context of pest control programme. Both of them regulate the overall system stability as they are dynamically linked to predation by natural enemies in the system. The present paper deals with the role of latency period in viral infection through mathematical modeling and analysis. We propose a four dimensional mathematical model with delayed infection in pest community. It is shown that there exists a certain value of delay, say T* such that for T > T* the system exhibits global stability towards disease-free equilibrium. But for T < T* system exhibits stability switches of the endemic equilibrium. Finally, some conclusive remarks have been drawn through numerical simulations of the model. © 2007 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.