NIRVANA

NIRVANA

I used to write poems when I was studying in college. Later I thought that the poem is something that can’t bring a change. But I was wrong. The poem is the best as a deterrent.

“A Tiger died,

A Tiger died but he was killed,

He was killed by killers and protectors,

Protectors for they couldn’t stop killers,

A Tiger died,

For his well wishers were fast asleep,

Fast asleep for they lived within themselves,

A Tiger died,

For the sins of humans,

Humans those I also fall among,

But I wasn’t called for,

But you can also say so,

A tiger died,

And we talked and wondered,

And we blamed and cornered,

But a Tiger died,

And we said ‘But’ and ‘Why’,

But a Tiger died,

And leaving behind a vacuum,

He left us to kill ourselves,

For if straight or otherwise,

We wouldn’t kill a Tiger,

For there won’t be a Tiger,

 We will kill each other,

The Satan will laugh,

And the Earth will cry,

But there wouldn’t be any help,

A tiger died.”

                          

Heavy Monsoon in Bandhavgarh.

The Monsoon is exceptionally good in Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve this year. All the ponds, check dams are overflowing.

पुंछ में सेना के दो जवानों की शहादत

पुंछ में सेना के दो जवानों की शहादत और उनके शवों को पाकिस्तानी सेना द्वारा  क्षतविक्षत किया जाना बहुत दुखद है. अभी पाकिस्तानी क्रिकेट टीम बड़े अच्छे माहौल में खेलकर गई है और, जैसा इमरान खान ने कहा, पाकिस्तान का आम नागरिक भारत के साथ अच्छे संबंधों का हिमायती है, तब ऐसी घटनाएँ क्यों हो रही हैं. दरअसल हमारा सामना दो पाकिस्तानों से है. एक वह जिसके नुमाइंदे आई. एस. आई. और पाकिस्तानी सेना है और दूसरा वह जो लोकतान्त्रिक पाकिस्तान है और जहाँ भारत की ही तरह तरक्कीपसंद और अमनपसंद लोग रहते हैं. सारी खुराफातों के लिए आई. एस. आई. और सेना जिम्मेदार है जिसपर पाकिस्तानी नेताओं और अवाम का कोई बस नहीं है. अभी वहां चुनाव नज़दीक हैं और पाकिस्तानी सेना नहीं चाहती कि कोई मज़बूत राजनीतिक नेतृत्व सत्ता में आए. इसीलिए गडबड़ी फैलाने की कोशिश हो रही है. आगे स्थितियां और बिगड़ सकती हैं. भारत को यहाँ दो काम करने होंगे - एक तो अपनी सैन्य शक्ति को मज़बूत करना और दूसरा पाकिस्तान की स्थितियों पर कड़ी नज़र रखना. भारत को सकारात्मक पाकिस्तान को सहारा देना होगा और नकारात्मक पाकिस्तान को अंतर्राष्ट्रीय मंचों पर एक्स्पोज़ करना होगा.  

The Delhi Rape Case is horrible. But all the endless and conclusion less discussions on news channels have never pointed a finger on our social system, where sex is still considered a taboo. It's a pressure cooker situation-as much as you suppress something,  it burst one day with all it's ugliness.   

One more tiger gone!! A male tiger was found dead yesterday at Barwara near Katni, in the Katni Forest Division. He was electrocuted by the live wire trap laid for the wild boar and other animals - the third tiger killed by electrocution within last few weeks, in the territorial forest near Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. Something should be done about these death wires. They should be removed or re positioned from the sensitive ares.

Good Rain In Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve

Bandhavgarh Tehsil has recieved 886.8 mm rainfall till 20 September, 2010. The average rainfall in Bandhavgarh is 1374.7 mm annually. The figure last year was 534.5 mm till date. The rainfall in Bandhavgarh this year has brought smile to everybody's face.

The Orphaned Jhurjhura Cubs Are Safe

Both the cubs are visible in this picture.

The cub walking away from the camera trap.

The tail of the male cub is visible in this camera trap picture. The bhiriya or Bhirra undergrouth in this picture is typical of Jhurjhura.

The remaining two orphaned Jhurjhura cubs are alive and playful. The camera trap pictures taken three days before establish this fact. Many fingers were raised on the forest department in the last month regarding the safety of these cubs. In fact, Mr. Chandrakant Patil, the field director of Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve, has worked day and night to ensure the safety of these cubs. All the credit goes to him and his staff.

Tiger and Woman

Sipping the refreshing morning tea in front of my cottage, I read the news –‘Lamiabai Baiga, age 42, village Bijharia. She went to collect wood in the prohibited area of Bandhavgarh National Park, where two tigers killed and ate her.’ Such news is a very shallow thing. It never tells you about the concerns of the life of man and animal and the struggles and pains inevitably coming with those concerns.

   After finishing the simple midday meal of rice, Lamia had sneaked into the reserve forest with three other women of the family to collect firewood, having no idea of the two seventeen month old tigers lying in the thick bamboo grove behind Judwani pond. She would not have stopped even if she knew about their presence, for wood was the lifeline of her tribe. It was required to cook food, to erect and repair their mud huts and to fence their crops to protect them from deer, wild boars and cattle.

   These tigers – a male and a female – were locally known as Chorbehra Tigers. They  were the first litter of a young tigress who was still inexperienced in bringing up the cubs. Tiger cubs remain blind at birth and it is only after a few months that they are taken out of the lair by the mother. Leopards, wild dogs and even jackals can kill them in their early days. But this tigress, being inexperienced, had exposed her cubs to the dangers of the jungle too early, even at a time when they stumbled while walking. Cubs lucked out and had grown to the size of a great den, but with very little training and an absolute fearlessness against the human beings, largely due to the early exposure. With the assistance of their mother they would kill a cow and feed openly in the field near a village, with crowds watching them from the safety of the village. The cubs had lost all the fear of humans but they had not committed the gravest crime of killing a man yet, though their entire territory was severely disturbed by the movements of villagers, elephant camp and cattle. The two tigers had eaten a spotted deer in the tall grass near Siddhbaba previous day and had walked in behind Judwani pond in the early hours of the morning. They were lying there since then.

   On that fateful day the four women picked the same area for collecting firewood. They seemed very happy and kept giggling as they got closer to the bamboo thicket. They were not walking, they were almost running. Holi, the festival of colours was close, seducing the women with unstoppable and bubbling enthusiasm. Spring was in the air, a little earlier this time. The leaves of Sal had turned into thousands of shades of green, yellow and brown, giving a different hue to the hills scattered under the deep blue sky. The bamboo too seemed to have turned deeper yellow overnight and Kosam and Kumbhi trees stood out with their new red leaves in an otherwise yellow-green background. Mahua was in flower and the air was thick with their intoxicating smell. The pleasant western wind made the trees shower their dry leaves and the forest floor was covered with them. The Brainfever Bird was calling incessantly from the depths of the forest.

   The tigers were lying half asleep that winter afternoon which was mellowed by the arrival of spring, when they heard the women. They were up instantly with their ears cocked and stared in the direction of the approaching women. Any other tiger would have moved away or shown his resentment by growling in a situation like this, but for these two novices curiosity got the better of fear and the male started to stalk the women with his belly almost touching the forest floor. He moved forward very cautiously with not making as much of a sound. His sister, thoroughly amused by his movements, watched him closely.

   Ignorant of the danger, the four women dispersed in the grass near the bamboo thicket and started collecting fallen dry wood. Soon Lamia was left by herself. The tiger, almost invisible in the dry grass hardly fifteen paces away, was following her movements intently.

   At this critical moment poor Lamia made the fatal mistake of bowing down, as she tried to pile up the wood she had collected. The hidden tiger, presuming that bowing Lamia was a quadruped, rushed and pounced on her.

   The uncertainty in life makes it beautiful. We all lose it one day, not knowing when, where and how. This suspense of the game of life and death is as attractive as it is tragic.

   Lamia’s mortal shriek was heard by other women who immediately rushed for help, but went nearly paralysed with fear when they saw a big tiger lying over Lamia and giving vent to full-throated roars on seeing them. They rushed to the village, crying and yelling madly. Their screams gradually became fainted as Lamia heard them, slowly lapsing into soothing unconsciousness.

   In the meantime the tigress had joined her brother. They were still confused over their unfamiliar catch, which they had not killed yet. Lamia’s torn cloths fluttering in the strong wind, her oily hair smelling strong and her bangles jingling on little movements put the two tigers in a dilemma. But the blood oozing out from the gashes received by Lamia as the tiger attacked her invoked the instinct of a carnivore and in a moment the Chorbehra Tigers turned into man eaters.

   All the elephants were called later that afternoon to scare the tigers away and recover Lamia’s partly eaten body. Mahout Mitthu, a distant relative of Lamia, could not hold his tears back as he did the job.

   The people of Tala and nearby villages crowded to see the victim’s body kept at the police chowky till late in the night. They became numb with fright and started fearing even their own shadows for two seemingly innocent tigers had turned  into fiends overnight and still roamed the jungle around them.

   Baigas of Bijharia created an effigy of Baghesur, the deity in the shape of a tiger, under the large banyan tree at the outskirts of the village. They worshipped the Baghesur and their priest performed many secrete rituals. The witchcraft assured the Baigas that there was no more danger from the man eaters now and the culprit tigers would shun the forest of Ketkia and Judwani adjoining the village. Truly so, for months passed and no more human life was claimed.

   Then came the month of May and Nautapa, or the hottest nine days of the year started with full fury. Hot winds without a trace of moisture blew even through the night. During one such stormy night the Chorbehra Tigers, along with their mother, killed a full-grown bull in the middle of the forest colony. Pandemonium broke loose in the morning when people saw three tigers feeding on the mangled mass openly, and right in the front of their houses. The mother left immediately hearing the screams and shouting but the two renegades gave a tough time to the forest guards and officials before they were forced to abandon the kill and retreat into the surrounding jungle. This incident caused uproar among the authorities and finally a special team was dispatched to capture all the three tigers alive and send them to Van Vihar, the famous zoo of Bhopal.

   Now there is nothing more torturous for a free-ranging tiger than the incarceration in a zoo. Most of the tigers captured from the wild and forced to spend their lives in captivity either die soon or go mad.

   The Chorbehra Tigers had committed a grave crime by killing Lamia, but they did that on the spur of the moment. They needed at least one more lease of freedom. After much debate and lot of appealing from conservationists and even from the people of Bijharia in their favour, the ‘capture operation’ was called off. The Baigas of Bijharia took a sigh of relief as they did not want their ‘Tiger-Deity’ further enraged by the capture of the tigers. They had lived under the awe of Baghesur for ages. On the other hand they claimed that their witchcraft had turned the killers of Lamia into normal tigers and they were not to be feared anymore.

   Lamia was soon forgotten but it seemed very strange that the tales about her promiscuity kept circling long after her violent death. The young tigers got their part of justice, but perhaps Lamia did not.

(The story above is based on a true incident. This incident happened in 2007.)

Kashmir Catastrophe

This is something unbelievable. People, both young and old, are dying in Kashmir but they are still violating curfew everywhere. They are emotionally charged by the urge for freedom. This is something like Quite India movement in 1942. Thousands of troops have failed in front of this mass public retaliation. Surprisingly, the one and only weapon these protestors have is a piece of stone. The ‘stone pelting’ is proving far more effective than the AK 47 or rocket launchers.

What has gone wrong? Why the people in Kashmir are so unhappy with India? Whom to blame for this situation? The Indian government will have to answer these questions. This is the time for self analysis. Kashmir is slipping away from the hands of India.

  

Tigress Dead

Jhurjhura Tigress, the mother of three small cubs, is dead. Some vehicle hit her on her left side damaging her liver and kidney. The tigress died at 9.20 am on 19 May 2010 in Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. The identity of the vehicle is still unknown, but the truth will come out.

I Support Shahrukh Khan

Any Pakistani cricketer has the right to play anywhere in India and I fully share this view with actor Shahrukh Khan. Being an Indian, I am proud of our culture of co-existance. The beauty of India lies in it's diversity and even the whole world can't destroy it. I can only feel sorry for the petty politicians of Shivsena, for they live in a very small world.
Muslims of India don't need certificate from anybody. They belong to India and even they can't deny from this very fact.

The cubs are safe

The three cubs of the dead Bamera Tigress have been found alive. They are well and the forest department personnel are taking care of them.

Death of a tigress

19 August, 2009. Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. A caravan of jeeps is passing through the village called Patour and I am also a part of it. We are driving along the old road towards a culvert, below which a tigress in her prime is lying dead. This is the Bamera Tigress having about eight months’ old three small cubs. The cubs are too small to survive in the wild without their mother, so their fate is also sealed.
We reach the spot as a crowd of forest personnel and villagers silently watch the guards bringing out the dead tigress laden on a wooden stretcher. The postmortem shows no conclusive cause of death and the whole matter is referred to the lab. Although, the incident seems to be the result of the two human killings by this tigress some months before. Apart from that, the Bamera tigress had also become an ardent cattle lifter.
There is rain in the air and a loud rumble of lightening sweeps across the grey sky. I watch the beautiful striped body of the tigress disappear in the roaring flames of the funeral pyre. The lush green forest in the background shimmers in the rising smoke.
I am sad, feeling a queer vacuum inside, but I am more determined than ever to save the tiger.

Bandhavgarh, 24 July 2009

It’s raining heavily in Bandhavgarh. We experienced little rain in last two years, so this is something very relieving.
The male tiger B2 is fine and I heard about him few days before. He was seen on a kill by a patrolling party twenty kilometers away from Tala.
The few months old little elephant calf Panchali is healthy and being cared well by her mother and ant. The family live near the mane gate.
The field director along with his staff confiscated a leopard skin from a shopkeeper in Budhar near Bandhavgarh. He also caught a gang of traditional trappers called Pardhis. So, something to cheer about as far as poachers are concerned.

Travelling With A Photographer

'In this digital age, anybody can pick an expensive camera and take nice pictures.' This I used to think about photography until I travelled with Lalit Rajora. I spent fifteen days with him, visiting Panna and Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserves in Madhya Pradesh, in the hot month of May,2006. He kept clicking around while I enjoyed being in the forest, wrote and talked to my jungle friends. One evening he showed his work to me and my jaw dropped with surprise. He had captured the moments. Moments which are always there but normally slip without our notice. He had captured the leap of a langur monkey from the thatched roof of the hut, the sudden flight of an Indian Roller exposing her deep blue colour, a mating pair of red and black Tiger Butterflies in greenish background and a huge white cloud scudding across the burning sky. In fact Lalit had used his camera like a writer uses his pen or a painter plays with colours to express himself. His work was pure art, full of imagination, innovation and feelings. One night, as we were sipping tea on the wooden platform up on the tree, a storm brewed on the horizon across the Ken river. The snakes of lightning leapt everywhere as I heard distant rumble of thunder. A strong cold wind started from the direction of the storm. Lalit silently picked his tripod and camera and worked near the wooden railling. Within moments he showed his pictures of the pink flashes of lightning and drops of rain. That was amazing and I still wonder how could he capture those flashes which hardly lasted for a fraction of a second...and those drops of rain in that inky darkness. Well done Lalit!

Is It Tiger's Fault?

Last week a tigress killed a villager at Timaria in Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. Now it will create uproar. Questions will be raised on the efforts being made to save the tiger and his world in India. Local politicians will try to take advantage of the situation. Fortunately our government is quite determined to save the tiger and any attempt to hamper conservation efforts will be met with iron hands. Now some of you may ask me on human grounds that isn't it cruelity on my part to defend the tigress who has killed a boy! Well, I will explain it to you.This tigress is having two young cubs and her territory is squeezed between villages. She lives in stress created by the human activities around her, like cattle grazing and collection of Mahua flowers and Tendupatta or beedi-leaf. This boy, while collecting Tedupatta, reached too near to the resting tigress and her cubs. Concerned for her cubs and stressed to the bursting point by the activities of leaf-collectors, and tormented by the heat of Indian summers, she got angry and killed the intruder in a flash. A couple of months before she had killed a stray dog in anguish against the Mahua-collectors, but did not eat the dog. This dog had entered the jungle with the villagers and was killing sppoted deer and their fawns regularly.In 1900, India had 40000 tigers. Now the number has come down to 1410. Most of the prime tiger habitat has been destroyed by the ever-increasing population and poachers are killing tigers and leopards almost every day.Only few pockets of prime tiger habitats are left now. And, when even these small pockets are invaded, such unfortunate incidents happen.

MY FIRST TIGER

‘Brain fever! Brain fever!’ The common hawk cuckoo called persistently that cool early morning, rising in crescendo and then stopping abruptly. He would not let me sleep any longer. A puff of pleasant spring breeze refreshed me as I came out of my hut, and was left spellbound by the beauty of the green surroundings and bright sunlight, falling on the mud walls of the hut. The cuckoo called from the foliage of the mango grove a hundred yards away and a forest clad low hill marked the skyline beyond the grove. I had arrived very late last night and could not see much in the dark, except the huge roadside tree trunks illuminated by the headlights of the car, and an infinite expanse of the star studded sky, which I remembered vividly. It was March 20, 1995 and I had come to stay in Bandhavgarh for next seven months. I was looking forward to see my first tiger in the wild. During the first few days I expected tigers everywhere; behind every thicket, on every bend along the forest roads, in the vast expanses of grasslands, over the rocks, around every waterhole and up on the hills. Gradually my approach became more rational and I started learning the art of enjoying the jungle in its totality. Lying in the cottage after the lunch I invariably heard spotted dove calling outside. It’s ceaseless ‘Kooo! Kroo! Kroo! Kroo!’ became an inseparable part of those warm sleepy afternoons. The chirping and long drawn plaintive songs of ioras and the harsh cawing of shiny-black jungle crows, fighting over something dead under the tree kept my sense of being in the jungle alive, as I read books or wrote letters. I began to feel that I was more at home in that untouched wilderness. One evening, in a dense forest patch adjoining a village in a remote area, I saw a changeable hawk eagle sitting on the ground under a sal tree. He torn threads of meat from a dead domestic cock pinned under his sharp claws, and gulped them down the throat, lifting his sharp curved beak upwards in the process. He also kept looking sideways, jerking his long crest. He might have stolen the rooster from the nearby village. After a short while he took flight with mangled remains of the bird hanging from his talons, and settled on a high branch fifty yards away, leaving behind blood-stained white feathers of the fowl. On another occasion I saw an eagle feeding on the carcass of a langur up on the bank of a dry streambed. He must have found the langur dead, for though the ‘changeable hawk eagle’ is a very strong bird, a grownup langur is a little too big for him. One day I saw him trying to kill a pair of peafowl. Perched on a branch, he kept swooping every couple of minutes, attacking the neck of the peafowls, which in turn tried to hide their neck under their bellies and blared frantically. Two jackals waited some yards away, their tails wagging in anticipation of a meal with their jaws agape and tongues hanging. The brave pair stood the airborne and ground attack, ran around in frenzy and escaped into the safety of a dense bamboo thicket. Wild dogs widely inhabit the jungles of Central India and Bandhavgarh is not an exception, though it is rare to see them in Tala rage because of the high density of tigers. They are regularly reported, along with the wolves and chinkaras, from the other ranges. The local Gond and Baiga tribes fear wild dogs and always give them a wide berth. They say that wild dogs urinate on their own tails and sprinkle the poisonous urine into the eyes of man, making him blind. In fact, this behaviour is associated with their territorial marking. Though a savage hunter, the wild dog stays away from the man and there is no authentic record of wild dogs attacking a man, or even a child. While driving through Subari grassland one early morning, I saw three or four wild dogs in the middle of the road. The ruddy-brown dogs with black-tipped bushy tail looked thickset, sturdy and agile. They were circling in an uncertain manner, sniffing the roadside clumps of grass and trying to mount each other. Suddenly a jungle cat, unaware of the presence of wild dogs, appeared on the road and immediately darted into the high grass as he saw his savage foes.. Gradually more and more dogs including bitches and puppies appeared and the whole pack began to move in a file across the Gohni Maidan. There were twenty of them and I was told later that it was the largest pack ever sighted since 1990. The pack frightened a herd of spotted deer and dispersed them all over. Jungle echoed with the staccato calls of the deer and the coughing alarm calls of langurs perched up on the trees. A placidly lying blue bull bolted at the very sight of the approaching wild dogs. The whole pack moved off to some other range as they were not out hunting this morning. Though I have had a great sighting but my first tiger was still there at the back of my mind. I asked the driver whether it was still possible to see the tiger in those late hours. Joseph Guddu, the elder son of Kuttapan was driving and he just brushed my quarry with a shrug. I was sure that he could not understand my longing for a glimpse of the mystical striped feline, reading about whom I had grown up and who was my old childhood dream. After driving for another five kilometres, Guddu jammed the breaks in a stretch of sal forest and nudged me to remain silent, putting his forefinger on his lips. He cautiously gazed to his right towards a dry streambed, strewn with rocks and partly hidden by the coarse grass. I trembled with anticipation and excitement as Guddu whispered that he had just heard growling from inside the streambed. We waited for almost half an hour but nothing happened. Guddu shifted the gear and we drove off. Being a born optimist, I survived the disappointment with nonchalant. The sky was blue and a huge white cloud blazing in sunlight rose to the heavens. A pair of shaheen falcon and scores of vultures soared above the cliffs of the fort, some of them roosting in the numerous recesses right above the bleached patches, a result of their droppings in the rock face. Suddenly a heavenly calm descended on me and all of my restlessness and anxieties were gone, leaving me as light as a feather. Things happen when you expect them least. Waiting in Chakradhara grassland one hot afternoon in late April, I heard alarm calls of spotted deer erupted near Siddhbaba. We drove forward hastily and saw a cluster of jeeps beside the road. The beaming faces turned in the direction of the long grass suggested the presence of a predator. Some guides waved at us in urgency, calling up our jeep. The driver, even before seeing anything, declared that a tiger is being sighted. I could not believe my ears and how true he was for surely there was a tiger! He was lying in a shallow muddy depression, cooling himself, swishing his tail constantly to keep away flies. I watched his striped face through binoculars and saw his ear with the typical white spot at the back. His massive shoulders were all muscle and the whole atmosphere pulsated by his mere presence in the grass. His whole body moved to and fro with the movement of his massive head as he began to lick his paws and boldly striped coat. Then he yawned twice and stood up swiftly. Many a people made quick remarks that he was Langru, the popular lame tiger of the park. His gait, slightly different from normal, had earned him the title. He walked towards Siddhbaba, almost merged in the grass. I could only see his back. Within moments he came out on the road, stopped and briefly looked in our direction. He was huge. His belly and hindquarters were covered with mud. Then, loosing interest in us, he lowered his head and crossed the road. I saw him spellbound as he walked up the hill and disappeared.. Twelve years later I sometimes close my eyes and still see Langue, walking away into the depths of the forest. I have seen generations of tigers since then, but that first sighting will remain with me forever