Gujarat jail inmates make houses for humble sparrows

Once a common bird, house sparrows are fast disappearing from our midst, say environmentalists and NGOs.

Now, a new organisation has been added to this list of sparrow worriers - state prison authorities. All the 34 jails in the state have started building houses for sparrow to make this bird's life easy.

RG Parghi, superintendent of Sabarmati Central Prison, said inmates of all the prisons, under the aegis of industries and craft department of prison, are preparing sparrow houses for sale and also for the state police department.

These colourful wooden-fibre houses will be available in the range of Rs50, 100, 150 and 200 for general public at prison produce centres in the next few days.

In Ahmedabad, these cosy homes for the birds will be available at Sabarmati prison's centre near Subhash Bridge, the jail superintendent said.   

"There are growing fears that with the change in the architecture of houses, sparrows are fast losing their habitat. They are disappearing from our midst. Through these houses we strive to provide these harmless birds a space where they can live and build nests," Parghi said.

He added that they took a cue from organisations selling or distributing such houses for this initiative. 

These houses will be available in different shapes like square, rectangle, triangle etc. They will be easy to dangle from ceilings, tie to a bough or simply place on a pedestal. They are designed in such a way as to protect the sparrows from heat and allow easy ventilation.

Paghri added that these houses will be placed at various locations in all the prisons of the state and police quarters.
Most importantly, the initiative is likely to give prison inmates an opportunity to give their creativity an expression.

They will try to come up with creations in which the homely birds can sing their not-so-sweet, at times, even tedious, but always lovable songs!