A gripping new story by author N.S. Madhavan has turned the highlight on a reptilian large of the ‘Cochin’ backwaters that vanished altogether from the Indian southwest coast up to now century — the saltwater crocodile.
Serialised over three latest problems with the Mathrubhumi weekly, Madhavan’s well timed story of man-animal battle, titled Bheemachan, revolves round a spirited, early Twentieth-century crocodile hunt and the Captain Ahab-like obsession of a neighborhood fisherman.
Sadly, not many individuals as we speak keep in mind that the tranquil expanse of the Kochi lake — the northwest limb of the Vembanad lake system the place it connects with the Arabian Sea — was as soon as residence to the saltwater crocodile (Crocodylus porosus). Presently, crocodiles are discovered within the Neyyar reservoir in Thiruvananthapuram district, over 200 km south of Kochi. However they’re the ‘muggers,’ the freshwater cousins (Crocodylus palustris) of the estuarine Bheemachan. In India, saltwater crocodiles (additionally, estuarine crocodiles) are as we speak confined to some places on the east coast and the Andaman and Nicobar Islands.
Crocodile hunt
Madhavan has devoted his compelling work to C.S. Gopala Panicker, whose 1906 account of a crocodile hunt in Cochin appeared within the Rasikaranjini, edited by Kunjukuttan Thampuran, beneath the title Oru Muthala Nayattu. “Students usually deal with Gopala Panicker’s account because the second quick story in Malayalam after Vasanavikruti (by Vengayil Kunhiraman Nayanar, 1891),” the acclaimed writer instructed The Hindu on Monday.
A number of British-era chronicles point out the crocodiles of Cochin. The Fauna of British India Together with Ceylon and Burma printed in London in March 1931 data the vary of Crocodylus porosus as, “The east coast of India and the southern extremity of the west coast as far north as Cochin.” Over the following many years, the hefty reptiles slowly vanished from the lake, the place a serious port started taking form within the Twenties. Habitat loss from the destruction of mangrove marshes and the explosion of human settlements alongside the lake’s rim, triggering human-wildlife battle, hastened their disappearance.
“The estuarine crocodile was one of many animals that our area misplaced with the destruction of the mangrove ecosystem,” notes Okay.G. Mohanan Pillai, former director, Forestry Data Bureau, Kerala, and former college, Wildlife Institute of India, who was a part of national-level crocodile surveys.
Indian Crocodiles – Conservation and Analysis, the proceedings of the primary Indian crocodile researchers’ symposium held in January 1979, famous: “Aside from a breeding inhabitants every at Bhitar Kanika — off the Chandbali coast of Orissa (Odisha) — and Sundarban in West Bengal, the saltwater crocodile is certainly identified to not happen in another former distributional restrict of the species within the Indian mainland starting from Cochin within the Kerala coast to all alongside the east coast.”
Some early accounts
An earlier work provides insights into the Kerala connections of the Crocodylus porosus. “Accidents, typically deadly, are of frequent occurrences round Cochin from these animals,” observes the Land of the Permauls, or Cochin, Its Previous and Its Current, an 1863 ebook by Francis Day, the naturalist who was Civil Surgeon of British Cochin and Medical Officer to the Authorities of the Rajah of Cochin.
It additional notes: “The dimensions of this animal is usually very nice, and although private statement is proscribed to 18 or 20 toes, the natives declare that it grows to 30.”
Day presents chilling accounts of a few of these ‘accidents.’ “In a single occasion a fisherman within the early morning, went to go to the nets, from which shortly afterwards terrible shrieks have been heard, however owing to it nonetheless being darkish, nothing might be seen: many fishermen being close to, they raised an awesome shout, and by the point they reached the nets, they noticed their comrade within the jaws of a crocodile, which turned so alarmed on the noise that it let go its prey. The poor man was so terribly bitten that he died the identical day.”
Two different incidents, the primary regarding “two lads” who unintentionally hooked a crocodile on their fishing line, and the second about two ladies “who have been individually pursued by a crocodile” throughout the area of a month” additionally discover point out on this work.
Previous accounts from the area additionally draw consideration to a ‘crocodile ordeal’ that required individuals accused of crimes to swim throughout a crocodile-infested river to show their innocence.
