After the last rhino was shot dead by a British hunter in 1878, Dudhwa did not have single one for the next 100 years. Then in April 1984, five rhinos were brought in from Kaziranga in Assam, and soon after five more from Chitwan in Nepal. Now three generations of the great one-horned rhinoceros roam in the grasslands of Dudhwa, and their number is a healthy 31.
R. L. Singh, an expert on the life of this endangered species, put this experiment in perspective when he said: 'The relocation of rhinos in Dudhwa is perhaps the world's most successful relocation programme of an endangered species.' This assumes tremendous significance when we realize that unlike tigers whose footprint is spread across the country, the footprint of rhinos can only be found along the Brahmaputra valley in the northern parts of Assam and West Bengal. Furthermore, of the entire population of rhinos 70% exist in just one sanctuary: Kaziranga.
My first exposure to this unique Terai region was Kishanpur Wildlife Sanctuary that's outside Dudhwa. Here we saw a lone rhino that had wandered in from Nepal, maybe pushed out from the herd that he once ruled. 'There are no other rhinos here', said Sonu, our guide. Gazing at the forlorn rhino, he continued, 'Saab, Kishanpur is completely cut off from Dudhwa. So even if this rhino attempts to get to where the other rhinos are, he would get poached on the way. His days are numbered.' And I realized that indeed there is strength in numbers, even in the wild.
Dudhwa, where we went the next day, was a stunningly beautiful mosaic of blue and green: rivers, swamps, lakes, grasslands and dense sal forests. An area so treacherous and infested with deadly mosquitoes that even the British soldiers avoided it like the malaria, for centuries. But over a period of time, poachers made their way into the last of the Terai regions, and shot out of sight every moving thing here. And the timber mafia left no tree standing.
That's till the saviour of Dudhwa made his entry: the renowned, though controversial, figure in Indian conservation, Billy Arjan Singh.
Billy was himself a hunter who had a change of heart after he looked into the eyes of a leopard that he had shot dead. They were pleading for life even in death. Just as non-believers become fanatics after they turn believers, hunters too become hardcore conservationists after they get converted. Almost single-handedly Billy fought for the protection of this unique forest and all that dwelt in it. He had frequent run-ins with the powers that be, but he survived because he had the same tenacity of the big cats that he tried to protect for six long decades. He became controversial for introducing hand-reared leopards and tigers back into the wild, though his experiments invariably met with success.
His film 'The leopard that changed its spots' is a wonderful account of how he re-introduced a leopardess named Harriet into the forests of Dudhwa. The scene in which Harriet returns from the wild after a year to introduce her new-born cub to Billy, and then walks back into the forest never to return, is an endearing moment when you feel blessed to have been born into this world.
Billy introduced another tiger named Tara back into the wild, and this too created ripples. But all credit to him for training these animals to hunt smaller mammals under his supervision before releasing them into their natural habitat where only the fittest survive.
One trip into the sanctuary was enough proof of its rich biodiversity. Sonu had an interesting idiom to share with us about the most prominent tree in Dudhwa forests: the sal tree. 'Sau saal badhey, sau saal khadey, sau saal padey.' Meaning, a sal tree grows for a 100 years, stands for a 100 years and survives for a 100 years after it falls. What a beautiful description of the longevity of this tree.
Sal also harbours lakhs of termites in its deep ridges. So they attract a host of woodpeckers: 7 different species in all. The overall birdlife too is very rich: of the 400 species found here, we counted as many as 96 in just two days.
Dudhwa has an interesting, and probably confused, existence as far the forest department is concerned. Originally it was established as a National Park for protecting deer in 1977, as half of the world's critically endangered deer population lives here. In fact, it is the only sanctuary in the world where five different species of deer co-exist. But sadly their numbers have decreased over the years. A decade ago there used to be herds of 100, now they barely touch 40. 'Lose deer, lose tiger', says V. P. Singh, a member of the UP Wildlife Advisory Council, succinctly. Thus pointing to the inevitable connection between predator and prey. On our jeep ride along the jheel in Dudhwa, we saw small groups of barasingas or swamp deer, their elaborate horns looking like some exotic, aboriginal head-gear.
And on one of our jungle treks, Manoj Sharma, an expert naturalist, shared with us his interesting take on wildlife-watching. He said, 'Don't look for the tiger. If you do, chances are you will miss a 100 other species: birds, insects, animals, trees and flowers!'
As we went on an elephant-ride through a forest path lush with grass as tall as the elephant itself, we chanced upon a rhino with her new born calf. And we were convinced that all is well with the relocated rhinos here.
But despite this success story, relocation attempts elsewhere are vehemently opposed by conservative wildlife experts. The most recent controversy being in Panna Wildlife Reserve in Madhya Pradesh. Here, the redoubtable H. S. Pabla was accused of releasing a 'tame' tigress into the wild. According to his detractors, he was providing easy meat to the wild tigers there. But he defended his action saying that the released tiger was trained in hectares and hectares of protected forest to hunt and kill. And that this so-called tame tigress had hunted and killed over a 100 animals, mostly spotted deer, before it was released into the wild.
Around the same time there was news of the Gujarat government refusing translocation of the endangered Asiatic lions to M. P. on the grounds that M. P. does not have enough of a prey-base and there is not enough protection from poachers. Is it a genuine environmental concern for lions, or is it the concern of losing Gujarat's Pride, I wonder.
In the 1980s, it was actually a veterinary epidemic in Kaziranga that prompted the forest authorities there to reluctantly agree to the relocation of rhinos. Will it require one in the Gir forest to relocate the lions? Mother Nature forbid!
