It's No Sanctuary

Times of India, Feb 16, 2010


Once upon a time a king built a dam to save his flooded city. The dam inadvertently left a depression, forming shallow lakes and turned the area into wetland. Little did he know that in a few centuries it would become an arid wasteland. This isn't some fable, but the story of Rajasthan's Bharatpur bird sanctuary. Renamed Keoladeo National Park, it is home to about 300 bird species. Once a haven for migratory birds, today it wears a deserted look. Reason? Scarcity of water has literally sapped the soul of this sanctuary. The extent of the damage wasn't clear until one saw it for oneself. I visited the park recently and was disappointed to find the boating area closed. On enquiry i discovered that the area that now looks like a piece of barren land once bubbled with water. So what led to this drastic change? Turns out that the lake was supplied water by the Ajan dam, but things changed after the Panchana dam was built a few years ago.

Panchana dam, situated about 100 km away, is now the major source of water for this place. But politics and agitations have played spoilsport. A war of sorts has broken out between the birds and humans. The villagers of Kaurali district, who use the dam water for farming, do not wish to part with it as they fear it would harm their livelihood. On the contrary, reports suggest that the dam has enough water to cater to both. But the war is still on with no sign of peace in the near future. The Rajasthan government decided to launch the Govardhan drain project, which would derive water from the Yamuna to keep both the parties happy. One wonders that with hardly any water in the Yamuna for Delhiites, how will the poor birds get a share of the pie? And true to form, the state government has been sitting on the money allocated for the project for over a year now. Though tenders for the project were floated in September, they were cancelled without reason. Who knows we might have to wait till our leaders call a pundit for a muhurat. Meanwhile, UNESCO has, after several warnings, threatened to revoke the World Heritage Site status accorded to the sanctuary if things don't change. I can't predict if that will matter; but for the time being, let's enjoy the site of neelgais and deer, for birds here are hard to spot.