Scrap Yettinahole River Diversion Project

Gundia river formed of Headwaters of Yettinahole

Today, Yettinahole Project to divert the west flowing rivers in the Western Ghats towards the Eastern Plains of Karnataka is on the table. Karnataka Neeravari Nigam Limited (KNNL) is ushering it purportedly as a drinking water supply scheme to supply 24 TMC water to Kolar and Chikkaballapur Districts. The scheme involves 8 dams in the Western Ghats submerging pristine forests and 2 villages for its 250 kms long canals. Two canals 80 and 50 kms long, raise the mains a reservoir that will submerge 1200 hectares of land will require a huge 370 MW of electricity to pump the water.

Following misleading claims by KNNL, the Project has escaped environmental impact assessment, environmental management plan, public hearing, environment clearance and environmental monitoring, in short appraisal by the Expert Appraisal Committee of the MoEF on River Valley Projects, which wrongly concluded that it is a drinking water scheme. The EAC expressed inability of appraising this scheme since as per current EIA notification of Sept 2006, drinking water schemes do not require appraisal, which by itself is wrong and shows how poor is our environmental governance. This means a scheme with huge socio ecological costs will not need even an Environmental Impact Assessment! 

It is nothing short of a stab in the back by the leaders of the region. The Yettinahole project, nothing but the  Netravathi diversion project, the name changed to hoodwink people, was given clearance in July 2012 when a man from the district, DV Sadananda Gowda was the chief minister Later, in February 2013, the Union Government as well as the Central Water commission cleared the project. In this case too, Karkala man M Veerappa Moily who holds the vital petroleum ministry, made no effort to stall the project but in fact supported it for the sole reason that it benefits his home constituency of Chikkaballapur, at the cost of his home district.

The project will be disastrous for the last remaining biodiversity rich forests of Western Ghats and in any case it is not the most optimum or the least cost solution for the water problem of Kolar and Chikkaballapur Districts. The project documents reveal that less than a tenth of the water to be transferred from Netrawathi basin is meant for these drought prone areas even on paper. In reality, it is seriously doubtful if any water will reach these areas. There is need for a participatory decision making process involving all those impacted and those in whose name this project is meant to decide indeed if such a project should go ahead.

A detailed analysis of the official 5 volume Project report from KNNL indicates that the MoEF has taken a wrong decision. With the support of politicians across party lines such disastrous schemes take off in this country. Who runs this clout? The role play of the kids lingers in the back of my memory and the kids who put the display were thoroughly clear in it.

While any sane person would support long term and sustainable solutions to legitimate drinking water demands of drought affected regions in Karnataka. The letter clarifies; Yettinahole Diversion Project does not seem to be in line with that.

It is said that Water conservationists Laxman and Rajender Singh have been requested to prepare a plan to rejuvenate the Lakes of Kolar and Chikkaballapur. Their methods can bring life back to the tanks within six to ten years while it takes 20 years to implement this project at a whooping cost.

Artists of Mangalore expressing their protest

Are Children more aware of Politics than Environment?

More than ten years ago when at a Nature camp in Muthodi or now known as the Bhadra Wildlife Sanctuary we had assigned a role play for children. The theme was about diverting the forest stream Somavahini that flows through the sanctuary to the eastern plains to provide drinking water to Chiturdurga. The project conceived by Chief Engineer Sadashiviah had made noise and fizzled out after some time. We had felt it was a contemporary issue to be debated and took it up for the role play.

 The children belonged to High schools but had one or two from the lower primary. The elders eagerly took up the roles of an activist, journalist, politician, industrialists and stake holders. Nobody wanted to be the Chief Minister or a by stander. I had realized that all other characters were vibrant and interactive in their young minds. A girl of about six years was made the Chief Minister. The little girl had accepted the role without choice and the elders had dumped it on her as they felt it was not much of an important character in the play. As the role play began, the phone bell rings and the Chief Minister picks up the call and will answer the call of the boss of a construction company. After all the pleading in a crafty lingo to get permission to go ahead with the diversion project, the chief minister very reluctantly asked “What is my percentage?” We were all astonished. Till date I have been discussing the matter with child psychologists to know whether corruption is a learned trait or survival instinct.

Further on many occasions with children down the Western Ghats on the other side, when asked about diversion of rivers they had expressed extreme generosity and said “we can always spare all the water that flows into the sea”. Such statements used to set up a fantastic foundation to start discussion about the importance of freshwater flowing into the sea.

 All through the ages about ten rivers such as Kali, Sharavathi, Chakra, Nethravathi, Varahi, Mahadayi, Bedthi, Aghanashini, and Barapole and their catchments contributing to total 2,000 tmcft of water washes into the sea annually.  Hydro Engineers look at it as a colossal waste. Engineers in Tamil nadu, especially on the Cauvery panel are even more critical about the issue. They feel it a distinct possibility to evolve an amicable solution if both the States were to cooperate and utilize all the 13 west-flowing rivers in Karnataka that run off into the Arabian Sea !

 But all these “wasted waters” have carried large quantities of humus from up the Ghats into the sea. Scientist s working at Project Sea Bird off the coast of Karwar, on observing the accumulation of silt could estimate their height while they were formed some hundred million years ago.  Western Ghats stood up nearly twice their present height when they broke away from Madagascar due to continental drift. This floating mass of land had its own fresh water streams even before the Himalayas were formed. The organic content and the minerals washed away by these waters have kept the marine ecosystem going.  The run off nourishes the microbes and they supplement the growth of invertebrates. These lower forms are the food base of the fish that the costal communities live upon. Some of the sea fish breed in the mouth of the rivers. Also, during monsoon the fishermen wouldn’t get into the sea due to high tides. In such lean periods the fresh water in the streams are the only source of fish for the people in the coast.

The Forests in the Western Ghats that brings rains also has a great dependence upon the rains. They too need some service charges which they make use to keep all the rich diverse forms of life to perpetuate their own life cycles.

How could such pieces of vital information be mis-understood and materialistically interpreted by the society? 

BON Voyage Samad bhai

We are pleased to inform you about the selection of ‘The Real Jungle book Bear’, a documentary of the real life of the Rudyard Kippling’s Jungle Book character Baloo the Bear for the film festival at Baikal in Russia. 

Samad Kottur with Teachers

The film was shot in Karnataka and a vast majority of it Daroji Sloth Bear Sanctuary near Hampi.  The film had bagged the Green Oscar at Bristol last year.  A member of this successful team, Mr. Samad Kottur is representing the film at the XII Baikal International Festival held at Irkutus from the 26th to the 30th of September 2013.  The Hasiru Hejje team wishes him the heartiest congratulations and success in his journey to Baikal. ‘I never thought that the Russian language lessons learnt on Radio Moscow in the early eighties would come to use in a real sense’ exclaimed joyous Samad. We are sure your presentation about your  passionate work will impress the volgas and gain new friends for yourself and the Sloth bears.

Collecting Data with the Local Community

 The theme "People and Environment" is conceived by the organizers to get-together, film makers to develop concern about the relationships between people and environment.  More than 150 films from 36 countries were received for the festival of which 13 films were selected for final screening. The films are produced by Germany, USA, Hungary, Great Britain, France, Russia, South Korea, Austria and Switzerland.

The jury of the festival will choose the "The Best Documentary Film", "The Best Popular-Science Film", "The Best Camera Operator's Work", "The Best Director's Work", "The Best Amateur Film", the prize "Baikal" , Grand Prix. Apart from the competition section there film screening upon films made on Baikal Lake, Sacred Lands, Some investigative and daring films and an exclusive selection for school children.

Also in the festival are discussions and meetings with films directors and producers, work-shops by eminent cinematographers and photo exhibitions are also arranged.

‘Radical Ecological Democracy (RED)’ for freedom, equity and sustainability

 Nirantara Foundation is a long standing theatre group that has kept Mysore culturally alive and active. The band of enthusiastic youngsters are kept on their toe through involving them in  several constructive activities such as conducting workshops, publishing books, making documentaries and voicing for the needy. They have actively participated in many of the people’s struggles in the region, like the fight against the Coal based Thermal Power Plant at Chamalapura, near Mysore.
The founders, Mr. Prasad Kundur and Mr. Suguna stand behind so many budding talents form the city. They call workshops to identify young talents and help them recognize their own capacities. Nirantara has been a stepping stone for a number of visual and performing artists who have flourished in their carriers.

Brain storming on defining "freedom"

 For the past eight years they have been organizing this month long workshop for the college students of Mysore under the name Sahajaranga.   The aim is to draw youth into pragmatic consciousness about the changing world we live in.  The work shop, though branded as a theatre course tries to expose the participants to a number of contemporary issues through thought-provoking lecture-demonstrations by eminent people from various fields.  About 40 students are enrolled every year and would including students from professional and post graduation courses. The workshops are based on different theme every year and “freedom and equality" was the theme for this year.

Activity for sensitising about environmental issues

A theatre production follows the workshop as an essential outcome which is socially relevant.  They are converted to street plays and intimate theatre mode for convenience to be performed more than once and travel through various colleges across the state. While the exercise helps the participants gain confidence in themselves, a social message trickles down the community.

 Luckily enough the foundation has great concern for Nature and concepts of sustainable management of resources and Manu K will be given a whole day to spend with the participants. He of took on the issue by making every one express what freedom to them meant. The definitions crystallized the socio-cultural and economical background of the individual. Every body had a struggle- some for an access to mobile phone, some for getting home late and some to pick up a suitable course for their own carrier.   He made very clear that we live as hypocrites when it comes to enjoying freedom and controlling others for our gains. The youngsters figured out that freedom of expression was the greatest form of freedom. He then tried interpolating freedom at individual levels upon that of the community or the state which was more or less same to every one in a broad sense. 

"constructive freedom of expression"

He set the participants into a game ‘Tiger and the deer’ to explain certain inequities in Nature, which is caused by the limitations of an individual animal and how animals coins upon them for survival. Yet they have some norms and principals in their ‘animal-ness’. On the other hand it is we in the name of compassion and for the sake of profits change those value systems and rules of the game to meet our selfish end. Issues such as food distribution and food security world wide were discussed at great length.

 In the post lunch session the participants were introduced to evolution of Social democracy and its practice world wide. The current economic struggles world wide was compared with that of the Indian economy with since globalization. The reforms had down sides since the growth created more jobless.

He mentioned that the northern countries achieved their living standards by exploiting their erstwhile colonies. India like China can never achieve those standards. The only alternative to achieve ecological sustainability and equity in India is to instill the value of Radical Ecological Democracy- which respects cultural diversity, cooperation rather than competition as the basis of human relations and all forms of life. We quoted noted environmentalist and writer Mr. Ashish Kothari and expressed the need to evolve a society that has dignity of labor and seek happiness and satisfaction through social and cultural interaction rather than only material interaction.

At one point the participants were felt getting over loaded with information and issues. They were taken out for a small energizing exercise. They were broken into small teams and asked to put up a collage on the ground with material picked up from the premises.  Being in the clutches of hard held debates the youngsters were free to express their inner feelings.

Film show

In the evening there was a screening of Philippe Diaz’s ‘The End of Poverty’ a long documentary that is produced with a great concern about the future of the hungry populations of the Southern countries.

Photo courtesy: Nirantara Foundation

CURRICULUM WITH MUSEUM: ENVIROMMENT EDUCATION THROUGH ORIGAMI

AN INNOVATIVE WAY OF LARNING

- S J Srinivasa

Regional Museum of Natural History, Siddhartha Nagara, Mysore a -570011 and De Paul International Residential School, Mysore jointly well thought-out an innovative learning excises through ORIGAMI. This programme was expected to ease the formal learning skills all the way through non formal techniques. The constituted target group was the students aged 12-14 years. 

This two day workshop was held at the museum premises on 14^th & 15^th September 2013.

The students were taken for a gallery tour under the guidance of Smt. Mujeeba Khanum, EA of museum, accompanied by the teaching faculty of the school Ms.Mamatha Satyanarayana and Ms. Komala. They had a glance of the exhibits provided with guidance in detail.  Students held discussions among themselves comparing the prescribed school syllabus and presented exhibits in the museum.

 Session – II Introduction to ORIGAMI - the art of crafting a piece of paper in to fascinating models.

The much awaited session began with an introduction to paper, the only raw material the students would experiment with. The history of making paper, its chemistry, the unbelievable dependence on paper and types of paper - created a story line for the next event.

Mr. Muralidhara.H.V.,an exponent of this art form, and Mr. S.J.Srinivasa MEP of the museum revealed the story of ORIGAMI. Students were taught simple techniques of paper folding and making them into amazing 3 –D profile.

They exercised the origami with full liberty filled with imagination. Slowly they came to know the essence of the craft, paper transforming into animal, Insects and birds, following the principles of geometry and life forms. Each participant skillfully put on show various shapes so as to run out of pieces of paper.

Meanwhile, Mr. Manu Krishnamurthy, a long time associate of museum and the Secretary of Mysore Amateur Naturalists put his effort to enlighten the participants with a taxidermy mount of a mute swan,  to learn the life of  birds.

 This activity enhanced their participation and scores of bird models flew in. There were swans, Peafowl, ducks, Talking crows, small unknown bird forms, Pigeons and what not! 

The pouncing enthusiasm leads to different verities too. They learnt how to fold a piece of rough paper and pull it in to a hopping toad, shimmering fish, and blooming flower. All precaution was taken that they are learning the prescribed science lessons through this exercise. By the end of the day they were able to understand why they had come over here.   The following day, children constructively participated in making more models with ORIGAMI which they put up for an exhibition.

Origami workshop link Curriculum with museum

For two days the children of 6^th grade of the DePaul International School had the privilege of learning without reading or writing. They were at the Regional Museum of Natural History trying to fold papers with their nimble fingers to find out patterns in them. First they experimented with newspaper, tore them into bits, squeezed, squashed and rolled them to a ball and felt the properties of paper.

 S J Srinivasa who had designed this workshop introduced the origin of paper and the art the art of folding it into models by the people of the Oriental region. His conception of this trial to ‘perk up learning process’ as he calls it would enhance the art of learning, experiencing and exhibiting.

The objective of this Workshop for Children is to reach the young minds to the optimum, through ‘Teach less- Learn more’ activities following the prescribed school syllabus. This ancient, Japanese art of folding paper is not only an art form to entertain people but a time tested, tool of learning and to constitute logical thinking in the pupil. He undergoes schematic learning through repeated actions. To be successful, the student must watch closely and listen carefully to specific instructions and then carry them out with neatness and accuracy.

The workshop had a long session that took the children round the gallery and Mrs. Mujeeba Khanoom gave them an in-depth insight into the plant and animal world. While Mr. Manu gave additional inputs on the morphological make of the animals that the children made, Mr. Murali, the head Master of the Beerihundi High School taught the students how to fold papers. 

Mr. Murali feels that this is a case where a student's success is imposed by the activity rather than the teacher. It is low a cost learning module developed by experts which helps to explore new possibilities of learning & understanding. It comes handy in the field of non formal education. The Educational Benefits of Origami are tones, especially when you handle children of heterogeneous group with various levels of learning disabilities.

On the second day, Mr. Srinivasa taught the children, some paper craft and mask making, an art never thought of by the participants. They enjoyed the experience of wielding scissors across color papers at free will but felt they needed a lot of experience to imagine and cut out shapes with bilateral symmetry that were so simple but gave such artistic profiles.

Ms. Mamatha, who accompanied the students, felt “like singing, games, and dancing, the pleasure comes in recreating the result and sharing it with others. For many students, it engenders patience, the ability to focus energy, and increased self-esteem.” She like their principal was astonished to see so many pieces of art emerging out of the two days workshop. The kids had fun, experienced a whiff of freedom from the four walls, the learnt a lot of new things pertaining to taxidermy and evolution. The exhibits will be on display for about a fortnight in the Temporary exhibits Gallery of the Museum. The other children of the school are sent to visit the museum in a beeline. What else would a museum wish for? 

Millet Mela at Mysore

I still remember those days in the nineties when two of our friends Ravi and Dinesh, fresh graduates out of Engineering college who pedaled vegetables grown without the use chemical fertilizers and pesticides on their bicycles. Except for a very few people who had known their cause nobody else respected their initiative. They had not taken it as their job but something more; their young minds were struck by the philosophy of Masunabo Fukuoka. They had read E F Schumacher's economics in ‘Small is Beautiful’ and soil science and ill effects of synthetic chemicals in ‘Tending the earth’ by Winin Pereira.

Mr. Dinesh Kumar

Entrepreneurs like A P Chandrashaker and Ramakrishna Bhat at Kallahalli had already begun to try out the natural ways of cultivation. They had given up carriers in the main stream and moved on to the country side to take on farming. In those days many people did it. Probably Dinesh and Ravi felt the need of a proper market for such products and they started to take to house holds and form buyers network in Mysore.

Mr. U.N. Ravi Kumar, Guruprasad and others tried giving a proper shape to the movement and started the first Organic shop in Mysore in 1997. It aimed at Nesara, stocking everything organic - from salt to sugar to vegetable and fruits. Through memberships they gathered from like-minded people to join hands to promote organic products besides encouraging farmers to grow organic products. Presently, it has around 230 members, including farmers and consumers.

In about fifteen years, Mysore has seen a dozen more initiatives. Not all of them are cooperatives like Nesara. Some tried adding value to the products like Ahara butti. Some stock organic products along with other items in their shops and some have a village-fair approach. They put up the shop once a week and remove it by evening. The markets grew and consciousness of the people awakened. Every shop had its own pricing and competition grew stiffer. An annual gathering to promote their common interest started occurring frequently. The networks grew wider and the melas got bigger. Today you find any thing and everything branded with an organic tag- from cooking oil to phenol, all classically packed and exorbitantly priced.

Every shop started profiting. Many regular customers started losing faith in the products. But talking organic became a fad and like religious cults there are always newer customers who become even more hard core. Our urban population is mesmerized to keep buying to help economic growth. Families found new destinations to go shopping.  

Nanjaraja Bahudar Choultry is seeing a fair on a monthly basis. It is happy to see so many products on display and to feel that the world is going greener. Millets are coming back to the market- not as an alternate food but as a remedial measure for the health of an individual. Whatever, it is definitely doing good to the environment and economy.

It is a hard fact that profit seekers surface from every possible nook in a gathering of people. It is the crowd who can afford at pay Rs 90 or 120 for a kilo of rice. They must also be people who may be interested in buying a site or exchanging a car. As a result, our Organic marketers are making a hey day always ready to showcase their unquestionably good intentions and put up a stall to recover the losses of a farmer, do good to the environment and promote health of the public. Of course all these things incur expenses and they are another unorganized sector that is fast becoming organized. They along with their customers or the organic people constitute more than 95% of the people. Alas, the remaining five are the farmers? One should not doubt how many of them are really organic and how much they are producing ?

We must know our Bills

Planting a sapling

In all of the School Nature club lectures I am taking the opportunity of checking out with the children regarding what they feel about the recently passed Food Security Bill.  A lot of students in the countryside are unaware of the issue or thoroughly ill-informed. Even in the remotest corner of Chamarajanagara district like Lokkanalli and Kesthur children in the government High schools feel that the nation would incur huge losses by its implementation. I need not make any special mention about their (my) dear teachers as they were one step ahead and related it to the nose diving value of the Indian Rupee.  

Addressing the students

Well, that is not as worse as some the programs being beamed by the media where religious fortune tellers finding fault in the design of the Indian rupee coin. They have gone to the extent of pronouncing remedial measures for the physical appearance of a Rupee based in the Vasthu.

How long our masses should be subjected to such (non) sciences’. Have we technically developed enough to stop imports of machinery and gadgets in any field? Telecommunication, medical or Military- we are economically enslaved to one or another country. Since Globalization in the early nineties through the days of India Shining to the present day when of Food Security Bill is passed India’s growth upped from 5-6% to 6-9% at its best and then slumped after the 2008 recession. The share of India’s Global trade doubled from 0.5% to 1.5%. The new wealth spawned a new generation of a very small fraction of India’s population. The entire period created the greatest wealth divide in human history. A study reveals that the top 10% of Indians own 53% of India’s wealth, while the bottom 10% only 0.2%. About 50 million people mostly of rural or forest origins have been displaced to make way for the country’s growth we have had. Fifty five percent of the 350 million urban populations still live in ever growing slums.

Food grains at the warehouse

At Lokkanally the school was upgraded to Junior College where I went for a presentation on ‘Food-water’ Foot Print. The students in the college had all enjoyed the mid day meal in their High School in the same premises. Now they were missing it.  None of them had the habit of carrying a lunch box from home. I didn't know if they were hungry. Who is to say? But what really mattered was on the same day there was a district level sports going on at Kollegal and nobody from this college was representing it.

FCI godown

We are a country with a quarter of the world’s starving population in spite of the great stocks of food grains that gets accumulated every year. In good monsoon years, almost 700 lakh metric tonnes of food grain lie rotting in warehouses or in the open. Economist Jean Dreze says if all the sacks of grains are lined up in a row, it would stretch more than 1 million km. taking us to the moon and back. Often, the government exports it at a loss to other countries to feed cattle and pigs instead of distributing it successfully to its poor.

Hungry people world wide in 2010

The food Bill is actually little more than a “Public Distribution System (PDS) Restructuring Bill”. The food grain requirements of the Bill are no more than existing allocations. Other entitlements (such as midday meals) do not go beyond the rights that people already have under Supreme Court orders, with the main exception of maternity entitlements. The Bill is a form of investment in human capital. It will bring some security in people’s lives and make it easier for them to meet their basic needs, protect their health, educate their children, and take risks.

In short, the food Bill is sound economics. It will put the entire PDS on a new footing and ensure much better use of the food subsidy.

Food security legislation

A Successful Workshop for Life Science Teachers at Daroji Bear Sanctuary

A Teacher experiencing a live specimen

A three day workshop for High school teachers of Biological Science  was held at the Nature Camp site of the Daroji Sloth Bear sanctuary, near Hampi in Bellary District.  The workshop was conducted by the Regional Museum of Natural History and intended to build the capacity of the Life Science Teachers. There were thirty teachers from Hospet taluk and a battery of resource persons from Mysore and Bellary.

At the bear sanctuary

Inaugurating the workshop on the 2^nd Sept 2013, the DDPI Mr. Narayana Gowda, emphasized the need of such workshops to update oneself to keep up in the line of teaching and inspiring youngsters to take up diverse carriers.  He illustrated the wasteful food habits of a squirrel and enumerated how they will be favoring the forests by dispersing seeds. The Block Education Officer Mrs. Sunanda, hinted that the workshop would be worth while and insisted the teachers to involve in it wholeheartedly. In fact she had sat through my session four years ago in a workshop conducted through Society for Wildlife and Nature. The Asst. Conservator of Forests Mr. Jalihal and Nagaraj, Range Forest Officer presided over the function.

Teachers involved in ice-breakers

The workshop was packed with Nature games, hands on activities as the intended outcome was to add life to Life Sciences and strengthen teachers to inspire youngsters towards life sciences. Field visit to the Sanctuary on the second day was a high light as none of teachers had gone into the sanctuary though they lived adjacent to it. Seeing the sloth bears in the wild, a nature walk that introduced a variety of fruits that the bears eat and an interaction with the Forest officials mesmerized the teachers. They not only appreciated the dynamics in ecology but developed a respect towards the tricky job of the forest officials who handle the Man-Animal conflict issues.

An outdoor class

The third day was dedicated to preparation of teaching aids using paper. Mr. Srinivasa introduced the properties of paper and began with an exercise of tearing paper to feel it as a medium of expression. He demonstrated origami, kirigami and mask making .The teachers thoroughly enjoyed trying out with a pair of scissors. There were slide show and film show and an exhibition of the handy work of the teachers.

Speaking at the valedictory function Mr. Santosh Martin said that we all have some bit of responsibility towards Nature and nobody should chicken out of it. Expressing their contention and happiness over the work shop Mr. Veeranna and Raja Khan felt the need of follow up programs to be conducted in their schools.

A fruitful reconnaissance at Bellary-II

Peacock landing  Pic. courtesy: Pampaiah Swamy

Sloth Bear with cubs    pic. courtesy: Pampaiah Swamy

            On the trip to Daroji Sloth Bear Sanctuary to make arrangements for the teachers' training workshop, we were able to meet up with some of the stalwarts of Bellary in the field of conservation and Nature Education. They all hailed from the same district and had different educational background and professions but their common interest was Nature and Education.

Pampiah Swamy Malemut: He is one of the good hearted with a multi dimensional character. From social service to wildlife photography he has had several professional stints. A sales man of agricultural machinery, an entrepreneur, an eco tourism operator and for a small period he was a politician and served as the president of the municipality of Kamalapura. His pictures are selected for the state tour being conducted by the Vismaya Pratishtana and Parisara, in commemoration of the renowned writer Poornachandra Tejasvi.  

Santosh Martin: A Mechanical engineer with an M.Tec is a long standing sentinel from Bellary who had the honor of being the Wildlife warden of Bellary. Apart from being a avid wildlife enthusiast he has taken up the status surveys of several species like the Great Indian Bustard and Long billed Vulture. His other passion is prehistory of the region. With a vast collection of fossils that date back the Paleolithic times he is trying to establish a museum at Bellary with of the Department of Kannada and Culture. He is also the managing trustee of the Genesis school.

Samad Kottur: He is a versatile character who beautifully manages time and people for his deep hearted pursuit of wildlife conservation. He started his carrier as a science teacher in a high school and now a lecturer in English at a Govt. college in Hospet. He is a long standing campaigner for Wildlife of the region and served as a wildlife warden and a member of Zoo Authority of Karnataka. He writes very proficiently in English and Kannada and knows to use photography for his stories and legal battles. He has a wonderful book “Daroji an Ecological Destination” to his credit what he calls a coffee table book but which is quite encyclopedic in fact. He is now working on a pocket guide to the Birds of Hampi.

A fruitful reconnaissance at Bellary-I

Ms.Mujeeba, Mr. S.J Srinivasa and Mr. Santosh Martin

Our association with the Regional Museum of Natural History at Mysore is long standing and our ventures are steadily adding feathers to each other’s caps. As part of their Annual Workshop for Teachers they were planning to go to Northern part of Karnataka. It needs a good camp site accessible to the teachers and cooperative officers in the Education and Forest Department for a successful workshop. Daroji Slot bear sanctuary seemed to be an obvious choice as I have been visiting the place for nearly a decade and conducted many programs for students and teachers as well. Every officer of this sanctuary had considered us as we had actively supported them in their campaign against ritual hunting and educational programs.

Stone age tool from the campsite!

 

 Mrs. Mujeeba Khanum, of the Education division and S J Srinivasa artist and modeler at the Museum and Manu K travelled to Bellary to fix up a workshop for Life Science Teachers of that region. Meeting the Deputy Director of Public Instruction at the district head quarter and the Block education Officer at Hospet and the Camp site at Kamalapura really had some rough riding in the country side. In between the schedules the team managed to peep into some local schools and interact with the children.

Ever enthusiastic kids of Genesis School

Active participant

While Genesis school at Bellary was a brain child of Santosh Martin, former Wildlife warden of Bellary, Kasturabha School at Kamalapura was a residential school for the drop outs run by the state govt. At the genesis primary school there were about a hundred children, all of them bubbling with enthusiasm. No body needing any prompting to speak.  In fact they were all over loaded with information about Nature!

Photography 

Ms. Mujeeba addressing Kasturba School students 

At the Kasturaba School the slightly senior children were eager to learn but quite shy to ask questions. The girls were all from diverse backgrounds. The teachers had done their best to keep them cheerful and confident. Manu and Mujeeba spoke to the children and narrated stories while Srinivasa showed them to craft paper into masks.

S J with his magical tiger