Embedded Files
“Jungle Jungle baat chali hai, pata chala hai…”. You hear these words and are instantly taken back to one of your favourite childhood cartoons – ‘Mowgli’. A fictional character brought to life by Rudyard Kipling’s – ‘The Jungle Book’ stories with his wolf family & friends - Bagheera and Baloo living his life in the Jungle, fighting and escaping from Shere Khan and his gang of langurs. I am sure we all have just been reminiscing the scenes of this tale from just this short description or perhaps it’s just me. I grew up watching Mowgli, Tarzan and a lot of Discovery & National Geographic channels and maybe that’s what instilled the love for nature and wildlife in me like the rest of us.
Growing up, I got to know that the forest, animals and even the story of Mowgli has been inspired from a small village in Madhya Pradesh – Seoni. And I started imagining how it could have been in reality. And I got the chance to see the Mowgli’s home in May 2022.
Me and two of my equally nature enthusiast friends - Viraj and Harshad decided to visit Pench Tiger Reserve and National Park. We reached our stay and we could see the entry gate of the park very close by and our excitement could be seen on our faces. The empty, closed entry gate was soon bustling with safari jeeps, tourists, shops, park guides and also Mowgli himself as a painted statue outside Turia gate of the park. We also joined the queue of safari jeeps waiting in the peak heat of Indian summer afternoon. At a distance, the forest birds and animals too were running off to find a shade of trees to escape the heat.
Soon, all the jeeps entered the park. Going at a slow pace while all the visitors whisper about the different birds, Gaurs nearby and also diligently looking & listening for any signs of Shere Khan. Passing through the meadows, we could see groups of spotted deer and gaur silently grazing away without any bother and ignoring the row of the human jeeps passing them.
Perhaps it was our luck that at one of the turns we took, we saw a few jeeps waiting and a tigress crossing the road. Even though it was for half a minute that we saw her, the experience of getting a glimpse of a Royal Bengal Tiger in an Indian forest will energize every animal in the forest and all the tourists for the rest of their safari. Within that half a minute, we could hear cameras clicking away and we were no exception to it. Recognizing the tiger and predicting what it would do in the next minute is a commendable skill which the forest guides and jeep drivers have acquired over the years. As they predicted, the tigress (Patdev female) had crossed a small hillock to a small watering hole and disappeared from our view and we continued the safari. But the real-life stories these forest guides who grew up in that forest can tell have no end and could become the next ‘Jungle Book’.
For many people, tigers are the main attraction for safari and one can roam hours trying to find one. But our Indian forests are so rich, that you can find other equally interesting things if one is open to experience the forest as a whole. Right towards dusk, we were parked at a spot near a small watering hole. The golden light of the sun was falling. At the other end, herd of spotted deer were grazing in the lush green grass near the water. A peacock was perched on a dead log near the banks of a pond. The scene really felt straight out of heaven. What I could see and experience that evening, could not be captured in a frame. Little ahead while we were returning, we came across a family of Golden Jackals who were enjoying the light of a falling sun under a tree.
Next day morning, we visited the Turia zone again in hopes of seeing the Patdev female. The forest was silent as ever. There were no alarm calls or any other signs from the forest indicating that a tigress is close by. We indeed got to see a good number of birds such as crested serpent eagle, drongo, etc. After hours of roaming into the forest, soon we were headed for breakfast and on the way we were delighted to see the large meadows as large as golf courses and herds of deer grazing at intervals. Just before reaching the place, we noticed a few vultures sitting on a tree. While I was trying to capture the vulture on a tree, I noticed that Viraj had his camera pointed towards the ground and shooting some black-colored thing a little far away. At first glance, I couldn’t understand what it was. I took an image and zoomed in on my camera and it turns out that two of the vultures were on the ground. Now, we have seen vultures on the ground to feed on a carcass. But these two, had laid back on their wings with their feet in the air. Sounds like they were dead, but no! They were resting and looking straight at us and soon turned away. This was the first time that I had seen vultures do this. While we were returning, they were gone.
The same afternoon, we left for the Rukhad buffer zone. The entry for this zone is right on National Highway 44 which is an elevated highway with several underpasses for wildlife to safely cross underneath. This was the first of its kind of highway in India. Many animals such as sloth bear and tiger have been documented using this underpass.
As soon as we entered the Rukhad zone, we realized that it was completely different from the Turia zone. Turia zone had more grasslands and tall Sal trees while Rukhad zone was full of dense shrubs. To notice anything beyond 50 meters at both sides of the jeep was next to impossible. Being heavily dense, Rukhad zone is blessed with numerous birds which you can hear all throughout the safari. In this zone, I was lucky to hear and see Indian Pitta for the first time. This bird is known as “Navrang” in Marathi which translates to ‘9 colors’ due to the numerous colors that are displayed by this bird with a melodious call that you would wish to hear again and again.
Being a dense forest, we had given up hope to see any mammals. After seeing many birds such as crested serpent eagle, Indian pitta, Drongo and many more we decided to once again take a round. It was post 6 PM and safari would have soon been ending for the day. We reached a place where a jeep was slowly driving in reverse and a tigress (Sakata female) was walking in front. For a good 30-45 minutes we had the joy to observe this tigress. She was on a patrol duty of her territory and was spraying on the trees at regular intervals to re-mark her territory. It was a game of hide and seek. Often she would enter the forest and disappear in front of our eyes only to emerge on the road up ahead and so on. Finally she reached a small pond where she walked down its muddy slope and slowly crouched to quench her thirst. At the end she posed for us atop a rock standing in a way ‘Simba’ would stand on pride rock in “Lion King’.
Overjoyed by this, we were returning to our hotel along a narrow road off NH 44 while we faced an unusual traffic jam on our way. Unlike the city, this traffic jam was caused by a leopard who had decided to come for water to a stream crossing underneath the road. In the torchlight of the villagers, we were able to see the leopard have his quota of water and go back to his dark dense forest beyond.
We returned to the Rukhad buffer the next morning. The forest was as silent as ever and every jeep wanted a glance of the tigress we had seen last evening. It seems that the news of the tigress sighting had spread and few more jeeps had arrived in the zone compared to the previous evening. Those who come to safari only to experience tigers and other big animals, they would be disappointed and bored within an hour in places such as Rukhad buffer. While no tiger reserve, national park or wildlife sanctuary can guarantee a tiger sighting in every safari; in dense areas such as the Rukhad zone it is very difficult to spot any animals even if they are few meters away. You may think that the three of us were bored too but that’s why at the beginning of this story I called Viraj and Harshad as my nature-enthusiast friends. We were happy to find and hear the bird calls. Their calls are a melody to the ears who constantly hear car horns and construction machines in the city. To see a blue sky with clouds against a dense cover of green and brown trees, it was a treat for our eyes too.
Night safari is something that has recently been started in many reserves and parks of India. We too wanted to experience the jungle at night. For public safety, these night safaris are only planned in buffer zones. The passengers are not allowed to get torches or use the mobile/camera flash. We made the arrangements from the hotel and we got in a line. When we entered the forest, the sunlight was very faint and within 15 minutes it was pitch dark. The only light around us was from the headlights of the other jeeps. We could hear the calls of Indian Nightjar and crickets. At one of the junctions, we got to see Indian Hare who froze as the light from jeeps headlight fell on him. A while later, all the jeeps had halted at intervals on a safari road with all lights off. We could hardly make out the shape of the jeep in front of us. Being a month of May, the night air wasn’t cold but it was much cooler compared to the evening and the children from other jeeps were slowly dozing off. Being in that pitch dark forest, we understood why before urbanization people would be scared to go out at night. Unfortunately such conditions still exist in few tribal areas and we get to hear about the man-animal conflict from such areas. A person won’t realize that he has reached way too close to the animal before it is too late. The experience of the night safari was completely different from the morning/afternoon safari.
The last safari of the trip had a wonderful surprise planned for us. We were at Turia zone again but the route was very different from the ones we had taken so far. At a slow pace we were driving and observing the new area. Every now and then a jeep would pass and halt to ask about any sightings. Soon a jeep told us that a tigress and tiger were spotted together crossing the road. This road was on our route and we headed towards it. The guide and driver told us that it would be a tigress ‘Langdi’ and Tiger ‘L Mark’ from the area and that the Tigress also has a sub-adult daughter. After hearing about the possibility of 3 tigers, the excitement was buzzing. On our way, a few more jeeps told us that ‘L Mark’ had crossed and gone inside and ‘Langdi’ stayed back in the grass but is not visible now. Another jeep told us that sub-adult daughter of Langdi is near the lake. The driver and guide said that we could go to the lake which is on our route but it’s near the exit. We decided to let go of our breakfast and head towards the lake. When we reached, there was only one other jeep at the lake and the daughter of Langdi was among short grasses on a small hillock. We could see her but she was far away. We waited under the shade of a tree. The young tigress was having her fun in the grass. She was rolling in the grass with her legs up in the air. It seems that all children are the same whether humans or tigers when they get to roll in their beds. Every now and then she would notice us. Nearby a peacock was continuously giving an alarm call looking at her. Nearby on the shore, White-throated Kingfisher was hunting the fish. A pair of Golden Orioles were flying over the lake. Nearby on a shore, a peacock was doing a mating dance to attract peahens. Soon the daughter came down near water and the alarm calls from birds and langurs nearby grew.
After playing in the water, she stood straight. She had heard something and soon we did too. The daughter climbed the hillock again and hid behind the tree. Her mother ‘Langdi’ was walking towards the lake from the tall grasses with a faint growl. She too climbed down the hillock and came near her daughter. She sat in the water near the shore. Soon the daughter also joined her. Soon the mother-daughter duo were dozing and we all were observing them quietly. The number of hours spent simply sitting and watching all this treat were merely few but unforgettable to everyone who witnessed the same.
While returning back with a heavy heart, I envied Mowgli who would spend his days in forest, experiencing a lot more that Mr. Rudyard Kipling couldn’t get in the books and that could not be replicated in any series or movie by any director. To experience it, you would have to visit Mowgli’s home and trust the forest that it will get you your personal best experience someday. I plan to visit Mowgli’s as well as all the other unsung heroes’ homes who couldn’t get captured in a book.
Page updated
Google Sites
Report abuse