Friday, April 1, 2011

The Tigers the TigerMan

Tigers would surely mourn this one death. Ananda Banerjee remembers noted conservationist Fateh Singh Rathore, who passed away early this month.

A bout of unseasonal rain calmed the heat and dust of the tiger forest. “Cheetal will congregate in great numbers today,” boomed a voice under the Stetson, as we moved along the royal lakeside at Rajbagh, Ranthambhore National Park.

In the late 1980s, a wildlife documentary on tigers captured my imagination. Especially a sequence of a tiger hunting down a sambar deer on this very lake alongside the palace ruins. Also seen in the documentary was this very man nattily dressed with a Stetson driving his jeep around the park. These two images remained transfixed forever — the tiger named Genghis for its strength and prowess, and its guardian, Fateh Singh Rathore.

Never once in my wildest dream had I imagined that a day would come when I shall ride with him into the very heart of Ranthambhore. This was in the late 1990s when by a curious turn of events, after failing to become a medical practitioner as my parents had desired and a short career in advertising, I got involved in the work of counting tigers in my fantasy land.

The first time I went to meet Rathore at his home, I couldn’t recognise him for a good few seconds. So used to the image he conjured in the many documentaries and pictures that I mistook him for someone else when he sat in his garden relaxing in a white kurta and dhoti. What made him look different was his striking baldness, as the familiar Stetson was tucked away somewhere inside his house. But his beaming smile under the flowing silver moustache was a cue enough for the legend he was in picture and spirit.

Coming back to our jungle trip, we saw a number of cheetals grazing; and, we indulged in some photography. Those were the days of film cameras, as digital cameras were unheard off. ‘Fatji’, as he was lovingly called, was using Nikon F3. I had a borrowed FM2 of the same brand. As discussions turned towards the nuances of aperture and shutter speed, we were joined by other tourist jeeps where one particular gentleman let loose his bazooka (read long telephoto lens) and went berserk shooting with his automatic SLR. Immediately, Fatji sounded his displeasure: “Hum mehnat karke photo khichate hain, aur ishko dekho, phat-phat-phat-phat-phatttttt. Ye koi baat hui, ye to koi bhi kar sakta hai.”

Rathore was in his eccentric mood. Further down the forest track, he let loose again: “Yeh aur ek pagal hai”, commenting on the persistent call of the Common Hawk Cuckoo. “Brain fever, brain fever”, he shouted and abruptly asked his driver to pull up on the side. I dared to ask the reason and he replied pointing at the sides: “Maharani idhar hi hai, aur yahin se niklegi”. Such was his command of the forest and its famed inhabitants! He seemed to have a sixth sense and his uncanny ability to predict the location of the big cat was legendary.

Apart from the ‘brain fever’, there were no other calls and the forest remained silent. As there were no alarm calls, there were no tigers — at least none showed up at that moment. After waiting for a good half-an-hour, he finally gave up. And we drove on only to get a tyre of our jeep flattened near Malik Talab. Other tourist jeeps offered us help, but Rathore whisked them away nonchalantly. A troupe of hanuman langurs hopped around in front of us as if to inspect and he let loose a volley of unprintable superlatives only to laugh aloud at the very next moment. Such was his unpredictability.

The light was fading and it was time for us to head for the exit. But Fatji was adamant on revisiting the spot where we had ‘wasted’ more than 30 minutes looking for the maharani.

The bend where we waited seemed devoid of any activity, but on closer inspection we found fresh pugmarks going across the road and vanishing into the undergrowth. This was something I never expected. Even without spotting a tiger the experience was magical. Reverence was the only thing that came to my mind when after a long silence he said: “Maharani ki marzi darshan nahi dene ka.”

That afternoon no one had a single sighting at the tiger reserve and visitors irked him at the exit gate by asking if he got to see one. He let loose again: “Tiger, tiger, tiger. Tiger tumhara naukar hai kya. Jab marzi bulaoge to samne haziri dega… Jungle mein aur bhi to bahut kuch hai dekhne ke liye.” Then, instantly, he suggested the possible location where one might get a spotting the next morning.

With Rathore’s passing away, memories of that blissful afternoon flooded me. He was the ‘Tiger Guru’ and the ‘Tiger Man’ of India. His name is synonymous with Ranthambhore and countless account of his work has been documented in films and books. The legendary Jim Corbett had once commented: “The tiger is a large-hearted gentleman.” I think of the same for Fateh Singh Rathore. May his soul rest in peace.

Timeline

1938: Fateh Singh Rathore is born in Choradia, a village in the Jodhpur district of Rajasthan

1960: Rathore joins the Rajasthan Forest Service. One of his first jobs is organising tiger hunts during a visit by the Queen and the Duke of Edinburgh in 1961

1971: He is posted as game warden in Ranthambhore

1973: Rathore creates a tiger sanctuary at Ranthambhore. When Rathore arrives at Ranthambhore, there are believed to be just three or four of the animals left

1980: Ranthambhore sanctuary is declared a national park

1981: He is ambushed, beaten unconscious and left for dead by villagers illegally grazing cattle in the reserve

1982: Indira Gandhi presents Rathore with the Project Tiger conservation award

1983: He is awarded an International Valour Award for bravery in the field

1988: He has been sacked as warden and transferred to an office job in Jaipur after remonstrating with a ‘nobleman’ caught shooting wild boar

1999: After his retirement, Rathore is appointed Honorary Wildlife Warden for Ranthambhore

2011: He is presented with a Lifetime Achievement Award by the World Wide Fund for Nature. He dies on March 1

Water threat: Billion-plus people to lack water in 2050: study

WASHINGTON (AFP) – More than one billion urban residents will face serious water shortages by 2050 as climate change worsens effects of urbanization, with Indian cities among the worst hit, a study said Monday.

The shortage threatens sanitation in some of the world's fastest-growing cities but also poses risks for wildlife if cities pump in water from outside, said the article in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The study found that under current urbanization trends, by mid-century some 993 million city dwellers will live with less than 100 liters (26 gallons) each day of water each -- roughly the amount that fills a personal bathtub -- which authors considered the daily minimum.

Adding on the impact of climate change, an additional 100 million people will lack what they need for drinking, cooking, cleaning, bathing and toilet use.

"Don't take the numbers as destiny. They're a sign of a challenge," said lead author Rob McDonald of The Nature Conservancy, a private environmental group based near Washington.

"There are solutions to getting those billion people water. It's just a sign that a lot more investment is going to be needed, either in infrastructure or in water use efficiency," he said.

Currently, around 150 million people fall below the 100-liter threshold for daily water use. The average American has 376 liters delivered a day, although actual use varies widely depending on region, McDonald said.

But the world is undergoing an unprecedented urban shift as rural people in India, China and other growing nations flock to cities.

India's six biggest cities -- Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata, Bangalore, Chennai and Hyderabad -- are among those most affected by water shortages. The study forecast that 119 million people would face water shortages in 2050 in the Ganges River delta and plain alone.

With an annual monsoon, India does not lack water. But it struggles to preserve the water from the wet season to the dry season, McDonald said.

West Africa, which sees some of the world's heaviest rainfall, will also face water shortages in cities such as Lagos, Nigeria, and Cotonou in Benin, the study found.

The study warned of threats to ecosystems if developing nations take water from elsewhere. India's Western Ghats region, a potential source for thirsty cities, is home to nearly 300 fish species, 29 percent of which are found nowhere else, it said.

"If cities are essentially drinking rivers dry, that has really bad effects on the fish and the reptiles and everything else in the river," McDonald said.

Instead, the study recommended reforms to agriculture -- usually the top consumer of water -- and improved efficiency, as nearly half of the water in some poor countries is wasted due to leaks.

"There is a lot of potential for increase in water-use efficiency in the agriculture sector, or indeed in the residential sector, to solve most of this challenge," McDonald said.

The study said there would be a need for international funding to help poorer nations "to ensure that urban residents can enjoy their fundamental right to adequate drinking water."

UN-led talks last year on climate change agreed on practicalities to set up a global fund to assist poor nations most hit by climate change, with a target of 100 billion dollars a year starting in 2020.

Other cities forecast by the study to face a water crunch include Manila, Beijing, Lahore and Tehran.


http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20110328/ts_afp/environmentclimatewarmingwaterpopulationindia_20110328191813;_ylt=Aku4GsO43NQdAAHjw4if7beFOrgF;_ylu=X3oDMTNsMm42aHVnBGFzc2V0A2FmcC8yMDExMDMyOC9lbnZpcm9ubWVudGNsaW1hdGV3YXJtaW5nd2F0ZXJwb3B1bGF0aW9uaW5kaWEEcG9zAzEzBHNlYwN5bl9wYWdpbmF0ZV9zdW1tYXJ5X2xpc3QEc2xrA2JpbGxpb24tcGx1cw