APPETITE FOR DESTRUCTION

Prerna Singh Bindra’s book is a poignant account of the ravaging of what remains of India’s natural wilds

On August 23, 2016, the National Board for Wildlife sanctioned the Ken-Betwa river link project, which will drown 58 square kilometres of critical tiger habitat in the Panna Tiger Reserve, along with its tigers. The irony is that Panna’s tigers owe their existence to a groundbreaking government-supported relocation programme that brought tigers back to the park after they had been declared extinct here in 2005. Why, then, has the government decided to drown its tigers?

Prerna Singh Bindra tells Panna’s story, and dozens like it, in her book The Vanishing, which highlights one of the primary causes of India’s wildlife crisis: the deliberate destruction of natural habitats, beginning with the Congress-led UPA’s policies of the 1990s and continuing with renewed vigour under the Modi-led NDA.

Of the many hats she has worn in her career— journalist, teacher and author—none seems more important than Bindra’s role as a member of the National Board for Wildlife between 2010-13. It is this role that gives The Vanishing its rigour: the hard facts that come from an “insider’s account” of the inner workings of our ministry for environment and forests.

The chapter on what she calls India’s ‘Notional Board for Wildlife’ is a particular gem—a gripping tale of manipulation and deception written with the dexterity of a spy novel. It reveals how an ex-minister and environmental hero finally gave in to the intense pressure coming from the prime minister’s office, forcing his hand to sign away protected forests for coal mines, mega real estate and steel. It recounts how the BJP dissolved environmental regulations to accommodate its new mission of “ease of doing business”, giving away core tiger areas to projects that could easily be located elsewhere, including 20 hectares of Rajaji’s core forest to the Shri Raghavendra Sewashram Samiti—to grow a herb garden!

Bindra discloses the heart of the matter—India has 20 per cent of its land under forest cover (including protected areas that span just 5 per cent). This 20 per cent is “practically the only land available in the country and thus much coveted; most of the rest of the country has already been used—built upon, fallowed, inhabited”. So even when viable alternatives are available outside forests, powerful lobbies clamour for new forest clearances in order to acquire “ownership of valuable natural resources: land, water and minerals”.

But it’s not all cloak and dagger. Bindra also draws vivid portraits of unsung heroes, who risk everything to protect their animal wards, implementing astounding solutions that provide blueprints for governments to follow, if they had the will. One such group is Odisha’s Athgarh Elephant-conflict Mitigation Squad, “a rag-tag group of daily wagers” led by Panchanan Nayak, who steer 25 wild elephants across highways and fields simply by talking to them. Bindra also links the loss of species and wilderness to our own inevitable demise. The end of tiger forests also means the end of aquifers, as the forests “sponge the short, sharp monsoon, thus feeding the aquifers that, in turn, feed over 600 rivers and streams…. It is not about us saving the tiger, it is about the tiger saving us”.

The Vanishing is a riveting account of one of the greatest threats of our time—the deliberate annihilation of our natural world and with it our access to clean air, sufficient food and potable water.

BINDRA LINKS THE LOSS OF SPECIES AND WILDERNESS TO OUR OWN INEVITABLE DEMISE