It was around 1030 one night when I had received an invite
to visit Nagzira WLS. Nagzira? Where? While I continued to speak to Rajneesh
Naidu of India Reconnoiterd, my mind was Googling to find this place on the map
of India .
Rajneesh was hosting an event named ‘Rendezvous at Nagzira’ where he had
invited 20 guests from different spheres of life. I had a busy travel schedule
for May, but the idea of meeting many photographer friends was enticing. Talking
to some of them did not solve the mystery as all of them were clueless about the
agenda of the event.
Some guests had already arrived at the camp. The campsite is
just inside the first level entrance gate to the park. Visitors to the park
have to obtain entry permits at this gate. We joined the lunch party which
doubled up as a familiarization session. Motley of crowd from various walks of
life – conservations, tour operators, media, photographers, tourists, resort
owners, formed the group. I was happy with my tag of tourist. The campsite is a
socio-economic development initiative of Forest Deptt and is run with the help
of the Pitzeri Village Eco Development Committee, a body of local villagers. Most of these villagers are rehabilitee from
the core area of the park. As a conservation initiative, Rajneesh’s group has
provided financial assistance to the project. The 5 acre campuses have about 10
basic tents of different capacities, each equipped with a cooler. The campus
has a rustic feel about it. A few more trees will make it cooler. Tents layout
also needs to be re-worked. There are a few small shops outside the entry gates
which stayed open quite late for the remoteness of the place.
Post lunch we setout for first safari. The core area of park
is about 5-6 km from the entrance gate. You have to cross a second gate, which
was the earlier boundary of the park. I shared the gypsy with good friend Udai
and Shovna. Local lad Bhavesh Nirwan was the 4th companion in our
gypsy. The park is like his backyard where he comes almost every weekend. Having
him as our companion was an added bonus as he had excellent knowledge of the
jungle. The park was in news those days for regular sighting of A-mark female
tigress with her two sub-adult cubs Jai and Veeru. This peace of news has
ensured a heavy stream of tiger tourists. 99% of the tourists are day visitors
who have single point agenda – tiger sighting. Tiger was low on priority on the
first trip. We wanted to have a feel of the forest. Roads are fairly well
defined and were in good condition, though dusty. Terrain is mixed, but
generally plain with occasional hillocks to climb. The forest has only one
natural water source, a lake by which the forest rest house Neelay is located.
Till the camps came up, this was the only option to stay. Due to scarcity of
natural water sources, the Forest deptt has
built many artificial waterholes across the parks which are the lifeline of the
park. In summer time, waiting near these waterholes provides rich dividends as
animals will invariably come to these to quench thirst. Safari generally moves
checking one after another of these numbered waterholes. ‘Pehle 2 no check kar
lete hein, then we will go to 7no’… this is how Bhavesh and the guides decided
our course of safaris. During the four safaris, we had many sighting of A-mark
and the two cubs. After having covered most corners of the jungle, we decided
to wait for them at a waterhole on our third safari. After locating Jai and
Veeru, we choose our spot carefully by the nearest waterhole anticipating
tiger’s route to the waterhole. During the hour long wait, Jai and Veeru were
resting inside bushes, around 100 mtr off the waterhole. The tiger tourists,
many in private AC cars, were crowding around that place trying to get a peek
of the sleeping tigers. To many of them we looked stupid to sit out in the sun,
but we knew what we were expecting. Jai and Veeru did not disappoint us. They came
out one by one, walking majestically to the waterhole, along our anticipated
path and provided us with one of the best photographic sightings of my life. The
light was great for photography. Eventually we left our spot after 10 min of relentless
shooting to let others enjoy it. The other fantastic sighting was of a flock of
about 20 wild dogs. We missed a leopard sighting by a whisker. Despite our
effort, we missed Dendu, the dominant male which is known to be temperamental
and charges at vehicles.
11th May, 2012. The Indigo flight from Delhi to Nagpur
departed on time and arrived before time. I like travelling by Indigo for this
reason. Udai, Shovna and Suez Akram (of Serai Tiger Resort, Tadoba) was in the
same flight. We shared the vehicle provided by the organizers for the 120km
road trip from thereon. It was peak of summer in May, and Nagpur
happens to be one of the hottest places of India . We had the AC on for 100km,
but switched it off for the last 20km of the journey to acclimatize. In two
hours we were expected to be out on a safari under a blazing sun. As we left
the highway at Sakoli and started moving through a sparsely wooded area, the
warm breeze wafted in made me feel that it would not be hot as was expected.
Green cover always helps to keep temperature couple of degrees lower.
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| Jai displaying Flehman's Response |
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| Veeru making a majestic entry to the scene |
Nagzira is yet to be declared as a tiger reserved. It is a
Wild Life Sanctuary (WLS), an IUCN Category IV habitat. It was declared a WLS
in 1970 and has an area of 152sq km. Both the core and the buffer area are
being extended to expand the habitat. All the villages have been rehabilitated
out of the core area. It has about 15 tigers, besides leopard and bears. The
prey base appears to be small which is a cause of concern. Lack of natural
water bodies will continue to hound the park. The lone lake is big enough and
was having enough water. Tankers use to pump water from this lake and ferry it
to the artificial water holes.
Tourist facilities at the park as of now are limited. Because
of lack of infrastructure tourism is at nascent stage. The gypsies are too few
and most of them are rickety. These are apparently 3rd /4th
hand brought from other parks. Rajneesh apprised us of an initiative to finance
new gypsy which are likely to come by October 2012. Once new vehicles arrive,
entry of private vehicles, at least the diesel ones, will be banned. Authorities
are forced to allow private vehicles which were a nuisance. The moment the
tigers appeared in the scene, it was a melee. The guards had hard time
controlling vehicles. This has come to be a common issue almost all tiger
reserves. Nagzira is no different. Accommodation as now is also limited. Besides
the tents, there is a forest rest house. A luxury resort was seen coming up in
the periphery of the park. Make sure to book your accommodation and safari
before you reach. In my opinion, one should combine this visit with Tadoba.
On the final evening the group sat down to share their
experiences and suggestions. The agenda of this event was to expose this motley
crowd to this place called Nagzira and discuss on the dos and don’ts to make it
a quality destination in future. Sustainable development with concern for
conservation was the focus of discussion. Need of the hour is to find a
sustainable alternative livelihood for the locals to keep them falling prey to
lucrative poaching. Development is a two edged sword. Developing tourist
infrastructure will bring in more tourists and hence more means of livelihood
for locals. More tourists also mean more funds for forest to spend on
conservation. On the other hand, development will destroy some its wilderness
and pristine charm. Nobody wants Nagzira to be a la Tadoba or Ranthambhore. It
will attract quality tourist only if it can stay untouched of mass
commercialization like many other tiger reserves. The big positive for the park is that it has Tigers and they are regularly seen.
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| Veeru in a royal stance |
A lively deliberation that evening enlightened us about
initiatives being taken at different corners of India . It was heartening to know
that trusts are being set up for each park where all gate fees collected will
get parked and will be used only for conservation and socio-economic activities
undertaken by the park management. Till now all gate fees collected used to go
to the common state treasury, which is used by cash strapped state governments
for all purposes – from paying salaries of government employees to build roads
elsewhere. We all believe that fund generated from tourism of a wildlife park should
be used only for conservation and maintaining the park.
Rajneesh played a perfect host. From cabs to safaris to food
to meeting with forest officials – they took care of everything during those
two days. Their hospitality had blown us over. They took care of even small
details like, ensuring bottle of mineral water in the cabs. I made several new
friends during those two days, some of whom I may not meet again. But Rajneesh
is the one whom I will certainly be meeting again and again in future. Looking
forward to my first trip to Tadoba.
