A killer of birds is now their protector

My introduction to Chilika lake didn’t really give me a sense of its vastness. Driving down from Bhubaneshwar, I approached the lake from Mangalajodi, a village in the north-west of Odisha.  Here, farmlands slowly converge into a maze of shallow marshlands.

My guide, Madhu Behera, took us to a fishing village. The path ahead narrowed down till it became a bund that divided the marshland into two. On one side, hundreds of open-billed storks had flocked together and were feeding in the shallow waters. On the other side was a dense bed of reeds filled with cacophonic streaked warblers. Suddenly, all of them would take off on a mysterious cue, fly around for a while, and land back on the reeds all at once.

Sea of a lake
I stepped into a shaky country boat and prepared my camera for the sights lurking in the distant, misty marshes. Using a large bamboo pole as the oar, the boatman cut through the brackish water, guided by Behera’s instincts.

Behera knew these wetlands like the back of his hand, and could sense where a particular species would be found. He asked me what I wanted to see — godwits, pin-tailed ducks, spot-billed ducks or Chinese coots. I blindly picked godwits because the name fascinated me. In minutes, we were upon a few thousand godwits feeding on a grassy knoll. At the slightest provocation, they would take off, and when they turned in tandem, they created a swirling silver cloud against the deep blue sky. Further down, bobbing in the middle of the lake, it felt like you were in the midst of a sea. Land was nowhere in sight. That’s when you realise just how vast this half-saltwater, half-freshwater lake in Odisha is — it’s 70km long and 30km wide

Unique wetland
Ajit Pattanaik of the Chilika Development Authority explained to me how such a unique wetland was formed. “It was a bay many centuries ago. Over time, tidal waves deposited sand in the bay and created a sand bar with a small mouth, virtually cutting off the bay from the sea and creating a salty lake in the process. From the western side, fresh water comes into the lake from the rivers. And from the mouth of the bay, during high tide, salt water comes in from the sea. This habitat thus became home to a wide variety of freshwater and saltwater species.”

According to Dr S Balachandran, deputy director of the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), who has been studying the lake for more than a decade, Chilika is home to about 10 lakh resident and migratory birds of over 250 species. In 1981, it was internationally recognised as an ecologically important wetland.

Then a dual tragedy struck Chilika. On one hand, poaching became the order of the day and even fishermen turned poachers to make a quick buck. On average, 1,000 birds were being shot, trapped in nets or poisoned with pesticides every day. Soon, only a few thousand birds were left.

Around the same time, the mouth of the bay narrowed till it almost sealed off the lake. This decreased its salinity, and freshwater weeds like hyacinth and ipomeas flourished and destroyed Chilika’s flora. It was then declared a ‘Degraded Site’.

That was when a man named Nandakishore Bhujbal entered the scene, and changed the destiny of Chilika.

Bhujbal has something in common with Dr Salim Ali, who describes in his book, The Fall of a Sparrow, how a sparrow that he shot dead kindled his interest in birds. Bhujbal told me about a similar incident. Youth in those parts had to announce they had come of age by flaunting the carcasses of birds they had shot with air guns. Bhujbal too shot down an egret in Chilika that he recalls fell down with a twig clutched in its mouth. The realisation that the egret must have been carrying the twig to make its nest dawned on him, and it created an unbearable guilt that remained with him.
the transformation

Several years later, when Bhujbal returned to his native village after a stint of urban life and saw how poaching had decimated the birds at Chilika, it brought back his own guilt over shooting down a nesting bird. So he decided to do something about it. On making discreet enquiries, he was led to the so-called Dirty Dozen, the most notorious among the poachers whose leader was the firebrand Behera. But Bhujbal’s entreaties and warnings fell on deaf ears.

When he tried to build up public opinion in Mangalajodi, the site where poaching was most rampant, Behera went to Bhujbal’s home at night armed with a butcher’s knife. “Kill me if you must, but spare those birds,” Bhujbal told him. But he also showed Behera an alternative path.

Right guidance
To carry on their business, the poachers had learned to identify the migratory birds that were winter visitors in Chilika. They had to keep track of when they arrive and when they start going back, what they feed on and where they roost.  In short, they had become experts in birdlife over the years.

So Bhujbal, along with his understudy Aditya Roy, started conducting workshops for the poachers to use the knowledge they had acquired to become nature guides. Roy taught them the English names of the birds, and helped them with the communication skills. Then they formed an organisation called Sri Mahavir Pakshi Suraksha Samiti to encourage eco-tourism at Chilika lake. The Chilika Development Authority gave them land for an office as well as tents for visitors. Now armed with binoculars provided by the CDA, the poachers-turned-protectors patrolled the waterways of Chilika day and night.

At the same time, the CDA opened up the mouth of the lake with technical help from water management experts, and restored the delicate balance of salt water and fresh water. By 2002, Chilika was removed from the Red List of wetlands under threat, becoming the only ecosystem in Asia to do so.

Behera, the erstwhile leader of the poachers, now leads a team of over 50 protectors. His knowledge of birds is so vast, I asked him which bird book he refers to. Smiling, he pointed in the distance and said, ‘That lake is my book.’

Factbox
How to reach: Mangalajodi is situated between Chandpur and Tangi in Khurda, Odisha. Take the train to Bhubhaneshwar and hire a cab. Mangalajodi is 60 km from there.

When to go: The season for migratory birds is till the end of March. After that the breeding season starts and the local birds take over for the next couple of months.

Where to stay: To stay in the tents or in a dormitory, get in touch with Wild Orissa. Log on to www.wildorissa.org or call Nandakishore on 09937153857 or Madhu on 09777553283. For accommodation at Pantha Nivas at Balugaon which is 30 km away, log on to orissatourism.gov.in