Idiots on the prowl - Why wildlife is endangered in India..

The Bandipur forests, as they are called in Karnataka, are some of the most pristine forests known to man. They belong to the Nilgiri Bisophere Reserve and are contiguous with the Western Ghats, hence making them part of a World Heritage Site, as declared by UNESCO. They also bear the torch of being one of the foremost Project Tiger reserves.

Any avid wildlife enthusiast should find himself landing up at these forests sooner or later to witness what a real jungle is all about.

And yes, this also attracts a lot of the laptop-wielding, iPhone-worshipping urban crowd as a weekend destination, and puts their knowledge of their own surroundings to the sword, which is when some experiences throw up hilarity as well as indicate a disturbing malaise that runs deep in a population that is engrossed with (non)reality shows, celebrity worship and brash consumerism.

Picture courtesy: Mr.Chiranjib Sur who had a kick-ass camera ready when we were lucky to sight the King.


Typically the wildlife safaris are done through the forests on designated tracks in jeeps and small vans driven by people who belonged to the forests right from their birth. Let me get down to acquainting you with the eye-opening experiences that I had to witness on the wildlife safaris.

Idiots - Part 1:

We checked into a wildlife resort at noon. The itinerary read that, we would be taken out on a safari in the late afternoon, around 4 PM and a guided trek into the wild the next morning at 6 AM. Around 3 PM, it started raining heavily and the message was given to us that the people who were scheduled to go by the vans could not have a safari conducted. This was because, the van-tyres could get stuck in the muddy driving tracks in the forest, and people would be stranded in the middle of nowhere. 

Some people were lucky enough to get going for the safari on the jeeps, which were a hassle-free affair, come rain or shine.

There was a particularly noisy Bengali family who were very blase about their excursion into the wild. Even the children were content just making noise and not enjoying the silence all around. There was an Alpha-female in this group who called all the shots as to when they would go for lunch, where they would sit and talk, what they would drink and pretty much everything else.

 They did the safari and came back with the sighting of nothing but a few Chitals (spotted deer). These Chitals are a very common sight on the roads through this forest and hence are not of much appeal to the normal tourist who isn't interested in a creature which pops up at every turn and thus has no presence-value.

Hence, they must have returned disappointed from the safari, which showed up in a grand way at the dinner that evening. 

She started bothering the workers of the resort to come up with the truth for a few questions of hers. She started in a loud voice, "Aap mujhe yeh batao, yeh jungle hai ki nahin? Yahaan pe koi jaanwar rehte hain bhi, ke nahin? Agar rehte hain to hame safari mein mile kyon nahin? Yeh resort, yeh safari sab natak hai, hum jaise tourist logon se paise nikalvaane ki. (Is this a bloody jungle? Are there even any wild animals in this jungle? If they were indeed there, then why didn't they show up when we went for the safari? We have just been swindled of a few thousands. I know what you guys are doing to innocent and unassuming tourists like us. This wildlife safari thing is just a sham.)". 

The boy from the resort who was serving dinner made some mumbling noises about the heavy rains, the low visibility within the forest to spot wild animals and the elusive nature of wild animals. She retorted loudly before he could complete his reply, "Kal trek bhi hai ki nahin? Kya karvaaenge usme? (Is there even a trek tomorrow morning or not? And what would we be doing on the trek?)". Errrr.. Madam didn't know people "walk" through the forest on a wildlife trek. 

The boy replied that there would be a guided walk through the forest and again she asked a question as to how much they would need to walk. 4-5 km was the reply from the boy;she was flabbergasted and she let everyone else around know loudly of course, that she would need to flex her muscles for a walk that long and that too, only to get cheated by these resort folks. 

 Anyway, she resigned herself to her fate and said, "Aap ko zaroor hame jaanwar dikhana hoga. (You have to certainly show us some wild animals)". Sure. The wild animals were business partners with the resort folks and they would appear as and when people embarked on a trek.
The worst from her was yet to come.

The next morning the resort folks took their group on a trek as promised, since the rain had stopped the previous night. 

The guide would have certainly showed them a wide variety of birds since this region is akin to heaven for bird-watchers and ornithologists. They also had a sighting of the proverbial Lone Tusker in all it's majesty and menace, before returning to the resort. 

Tea and breakfast was offered and all she could say of the whole experience was "Yeh forest tho waste hai.. Yahaan pe Camel bhi nahin hai aur Lion bhi nahin hai.. Hamara poora weekend waste hogaya..(We wasted our weekend on this stupid forest, which does not even have a camel or a lion)".
She expected Camels and Lions in South India. Beat that!!!!

I was thankful to National Geographic that she knew camels and lions existed, while she was surfing channels to watch different reality shows.

Idiots - Part 2:

The next afternoon, when we went to the jeep for our safari, a large posse of cops had just dropped into the resort. As is the norm in India, bureaucrats and politicians run roughshod stamping their authority on hapless citizens at every opportunity.

It was someone in the Babudom from the North, his wife, his parents and his brothers-in-law, who were acting important by telling the resort folks to do this and not do that. The resort folks had to arrange a safari for them out of the blue, by inconveniencing other tourists, and provide them with special treatment wherever possible.

Myself and my wife had to be stuffed into the same jeep as them, and we had the unenviable luck of witnessing the haughty attitude of the powerful.

The driver of this jeep was a local and had a superb eye for any movement around. And he had an unwavering concentration. 

He spotted a Serpent Eagle. It was a predator in all its glory. There was an elderly lady among the haughty group, who replied "Hum wahaan se yahaan Eagle dekhne aaye hai kya??(Have we come all the way to see an Eagle??)". They did not even give a fuck to the fact that this man had spotted it in the middle of two tree branches of exactly the same colour as the Eagle. It took about a minute for us to spot it as it was so well camouflaged.

Then he showed us a Woodpecker knocking away at a tree trunk, and this was a wonderful sight as it was completely at home with itself even as we moved towards it. 

To this, the bureaucrat about whom all the fuss was, shouted in a totally condescending tone, "Abey... Jaanwar dikha jaanwar!. Hum ye dekhne nahi aaye!(Hey.. Show us some animals! We did not come to see these!)". So, the driver could just call out to some animals and say, "Some IAS/IPS officer from the Babudom has come to the forest. So all animals are hereby ordered to line up and salute him", and the animals would just come out and stand in a line to greet him just as the Babu's chhelas do!

We got to see a magnificent herd of the Great Indian Gaur (Indian Bison) headed by so huge a male that some people including my wife mistook it for an elephant. And with such nervous animals as these around they started poking their hands out of the jeep and clicking away some snaps. 

Everyone thought it wise to stay silent around these powerful animals, but these people were chatting away to glory, much to the irritation of other tourists on the jeep. And one guy from this group who undoubtedly valued wildlife 'a lot' went, "Aur kitni der tak yeh bail dekh te yahi pe rukenge.. Chalo Chalo, kuch aur bhi dikhao! (For how much more time do we stay here and look at these buffalo. Get a move on and show us something else too!)".

We then got to see some beautiful Peacocks strutting around to which, pat came the suggestion from the same guy, "Yeh bahut tasty hote hain! (These birds are very tasty!)".

We passed through an area which was engulfed by the unbearable stench of decaying meat. The driver informed us that it was a Bison killed by a Tiger 3-4 days back which was the cause of this stench. 

A lady on that group not wanting to be left behind in their race for idiocy, heard the driver's information in parts and started telling people in her group that a Bison had killed a tiger causing this stench.(What does she smoke!) Myself and my wife had a hearty laugh at this.

We spotted a female Sloth Bear and it's cub, an hour later, by which time these people had exhausted their intellect and energy speaking about all sorts of stupid things such as TV shows, advertisements, and celebrities.

We got back to the resort, and we thanked the driver for the excursion into the wild. These people did not have so much as a word of thanks to tell him. Instead, they said, "Yaar tumne Lion bhi nahin dikhaya, Tiger bhi nahin dikhaya. (You neither showed us a Lion nor a Tiger)". A Babu wants to see a Lion in a forest of South India. He passed the Civil Services exam with such great knowledge!

On this blissful sojourn to the Bandipur forests, these incorrigibly bright people gave me the idea that it is this haughty attitude, ignorance, indifference and lack of respect for wildlife which is driving some of our glorious species such as the Royal Bengal Tiger, the Indian Rhino, the Asiatic Lion, the Asian Elephant etcetera, towards extinction and why some of our most beautiful animals such as the Asiatic Cheetah vanished from India altogether.