Mysterious suicide of birds in Assam village portrayed in poems - via Richard Muirhead

Jatinga, a small tribal village and Assam’s only hill station, is known for the mysterious suicide of birds during certain weeks of the year.

ART-AND-CULTURE Updated: Feb 18, 2020 14:48 IST

Indo Asian News Service

While scientists and ornithologists have been trying to explore and understand the mystery as to why birds behave in a particular manner during those weeks in Jatinga, Guwahati-based poet and award-winning author Tapati Baruah Kashyap has chosen to tell the stories of the birds, the beautiful place and the people living there through her poems.(Unsplash)

Jatinga, a small tribal village and Assam’s only hill station, is known for the mysterious suicide of birds during certain weeks of the year. While scientists and ornithologists have been trying to explore and understand the mystery as to why birds behave in a particular manner during those weeks in Jatinga, Guwahati-based poet and award-winning author Tapati Baruah Kashyap has chosen to tell the stories of the birds, the beautiful place and the people living there through her poems.

“In Love With Jatinga” is a collection of 50 poems through which the poet not only asks the often-repeated question as to why the birds of Jatinga meet death in such a mysterious manner, but also takes readers through this place, which is located on the lap of the lofty Borail mountain (in southern Assam).

“Jatinga is not about birds alone. It has lovely people, lovely oranges and pineapples, and breath-taking natural scenery all around. It is a little paradise on earth,” Kashyap says. The poet, in the opening of her book has dedicated it to “serene people, serene place, spotless nature, in the lap of Jatinga.”

The mysterious birds’ phenomenon has made Jatinga, only nine km from the mountainous Haflong, the district Headquarters of Dima Hasao in Assam, world famous for the strange behaviour of the migratory birds that takes place during the months of September to November. As many as 24 of the 50 poems are about this village, its people, its birds, winding pathways, sweet breeze, the headman, its founding fathers, its hard-working women, and so on.

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How One Woman With a Special Plan Saved Assam’s ‘Hargila’ Storks From Extinction

by Rinchen Norbu WangchukAugust 1, 2019, 8:07 pm

Back in 2014, the Zoological Society of London identified the Greater Adjutant Stork, an unusual species of scavenging birds, as one close to extinction or an EDGE (Evolutionarily Distinct and Globally Endangered) species.

This ungainly scavenger, considered by many as a disease-carrying creature and a bad omen, was once commonly found across the wetlands in Southeast Asia. Today, less than 1,200 are left in the world of which more than 75 per cent are residing in Assam itself.

For award-winning conservationist Purnima Devi Barman, this species, locally referred to as the ‘Hargila’ (bone-swallowers), has always been a friend.

Fondly referred to as the ‘Hargila Baideu’ (Stork Sister) by the local community for the work she has been doing for the birds, Purnima has dedicated her life to protect the Greater Adjutant by stopping landowners from cutting down their nesting sites, and taking matters to court for the protection of the wetlands from rampant concrete construction.

Read on

Swamp grass-babbler, a rare bird seen near Chandrapur area in Guwahati

G PLUS NEWS | DECEMBER 29, 2018 13:29 HRS

GUWAHATI: A student from Kerela, Leons Mathew Abraham studying at the College of Veterinary Sciences in Assam spotted a rare bird, the Swamp grass-babbler, near the Chandrapur area in Guwahati. 

The scientific name for the bird is Laticilla cinerascens and it is also commonly known as swamp prinia. It is one of the most endangered grassland birds in India in the area. 

Abraham said that the rare bird is really hard to spot, but after visiting the sar in the evening a few times, he was able to hide and shoot a video and even get a few pictures before it disappeared into the tussocks. He also mentioned that it was a shock to see the bird in this area as this habitat is not really good for the bird and its future is bleak on the island. 

This endangered bird species is specific to the Brahmaputra and Cachar plains. However, all recent findings have found that the bird comes from a small pocket in Upper Assam and adjacent areas of Arunachal Pradesh. The Swamp Prinia used to be found in the Dibru Saikhowa-Amarpur area but went unrecorded for four years until it was found again in the D’Ering grasslands of Arunachal a few years ago.

Assam birder, Pritam Baruah explained that the record for seeing these birds in Guwahati is unexpected and significant as there has been no confirmed records outside the Dibru Saikhowa-Amarpur-D’Ering region for decades and there are still not many suitable habitats around the city. The finding of the bird in a seasonal river island hints that the species is prone to opportunistic movements along the Brahmaputra, which also shows the importance of conserving the river island ecosystem in Assam.

Source  

Guwahati counts its ‘ugly old bird’ annually — and this year it’s good news

In a recent survey done in Guwahati by conservation society Early Birds, the endangered Greater Adjutant Stork (or Hargilla) population was pegged at the ‘stable’ figure of 220. But according to local activists, habitat loss for the bird continues to be a pressing problem.

Written by Tora Agarwala | Guwahati | Updated: September 15, 2018 8:30:27 pm

In a recent survey done in Guwahati last week by conservation society Early Birds, the Hargilla population was pegged at 220.

While traffic jams in a city like Guwahati are commonplace, last year — a day before Diwali — the cause for a hold-up in GS Road was an unexpected one: a huge, gangly bird, seemingly lost among the din of cars and people as it tried to make sense of its new surroundings. 

Before the concerned authorities could come rescue it, the bird — an endangered species called the Greater Adjutant Stork, locally known as the Hargilla — took off itself. However, for the stork, adapting to changing environs is something it has been compelled to do over the last few decades. As its natural habitat — wetlands (or beels) — disappear, the stork has taken to living in garbage dumps which dot the city of Guwahati, the biggest one behind the Guwahati Medical College. 

For long, villagers would shun the stork, but today, conservation efforts by local organisations and activists have changed the its fate.

Ignored for years, recent media reports have extensively covered conservation efforts to protect Assam’s “ugly old bird” — at a height of five feet, with an eight-foot wing span, reports show that out of the 1,200 Hargillas in the world, about 800 are in Assam. It features in the IUCN Red List of Threatened Species — in 1988, it was “threatened” but from 1994, it has been considered “endangered”. The decline goes back to the first half of the 20th century — but the bird can still be spotted parts of Bangladesh, Cambodia, Nepal, Thailand, Vietnam — and India, of course (mostly Assam and Bihar).

Read on 

Traditional buffalo and bird fights put off in Assam

Press Trust of India | Morigaon January 16, 2016 Last Updated at 15:57 IST

The traditional buffalo fight in Morigaon and the bulbuli fight in Hajo held on the occasion of Magh Bihu in Assam were today put off in deference to court orders. 

In view of a Supreme Court ban, the traditional buffalo fight on the occasion of Magh Bihu organised by the Ahotguri Buffalo Fight Organising Committee, was not held in Morigaon district. 

Some local buffalo keepers however, organised a token match of the traditional buffalo fight ensuring that no animal was hurt, a district official said 

No action was taken against the keepers as it was only a token fight and no official complaint was received against them, the official said. 

The Gauhati High Court had recently banned another traditional event held during the Magh Bihu festival responding to pleas that they were cruel to bulbuli birds. 

On January 12, the High Court after hearing an application filed by the Animal Welfare Board of India, passed an order banning the traditional bulbuli bird fight at the Hayagrib Madhab Mandir in Hajo in Assam after considering various provisions of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972 and Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1960.

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Now, ban on bulbul bird fight in Assam temple

Wednesday, January 13, 2016, 20:07 [IST] 

The Gauhati High Court has banned the traditional bulbul bird fight at the Hayagrib Madhab Mandir, an ancient pilgrim centre at Hajo in Assam. Vacation bench judge Rumi Kumari Phukan passed the order yesterday after considering various provisions of the Wildlife Protection Act 1972 and Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act 1960. 

The judge modified the earlier order passed on December 22 whereby the ban of bulbul fight imposed by Kamrup district administration was kept in abeyance. The application was filed by Animal Welfare Board of India. The order triggered reactions in Hajo and across the state with the temple priests claiming the bird fight was part of a religious ritual in which obeisance to Lord Vishnu began with it. 

The priests were also in dilemma as how to conduct the religious ceremony going on for centuries in view of the court order.

Read more at:

Assam village made famous by a bird

Guwahati, October 6
Dadara is not just another village in Assam’s Brahmaputra Valley. Located about one-hour drive away from Guwahati, the village boasts of a rare tree-top nesting colony of the endangered Greater Adjutant Storks.

The colony of the rare Greater Adjutant Storks at Dadara village has become a sort of role model for conservation of rare avian species with community participation, thanks to a sustained programme of the Aaranyak, a society for bio-diversity conservation.

“Out of the 20 stork species surviving on Earth, the Greater Adjutant is the rarest having a global population of less than 1,000. Its habitats are found only in a few places of Cambodia, Bihar and Assam,” said Aaranyak researcher Purnima Devi Barman.

The Brahmaputra Valley of Assam accounts for about 85 per cent (over 800 units) of the global population of the bird and is considered a major stronghold of the species. Habitat destruction is found to be a primary cause for the declining population of the stork. 

Being a colonial bird, the Greater Adjutant Stork breeds in colonies atop tall trees grown on private land. The survival of these birds mainly depends on the willingness and support of the nest tree owners towards the conservation effort. 

Continued:  http://www.tribuneindia.com/2012/20121007/main6.htm