Tiger hearted welfare

The New Indian Express , Sunday, March 24, 2013
Correspondent : Sundari Sivasubbu
Thanks to silent crusaders like Divya Shrivastava, we can still recite the lines: “Tiger, tiger, burning bright, In the forests of the night” from William Blake’s poem ‘The Tyger’ if we happen to visit Ranthambore in Rajasthan.

This young, soft-spoken woman’s determination and innovative application of the spirit of enterprise is not only giving the majestic predator a lease of life, but also saving local artisans from vanishing forever.

One of the biggest and most renowned national parks in north India, Ranathambore is not only a major wildlife tourism attraction, but also a famous hunting ground favoured by the Maharajas of Jaipur to the present-day poachers. With little development or employment opportunities, the local tribes often turn to poaching as a means to earn and to feed their families. Laws exist but help neither the endangered animal nor the locals who are themselves on the edge of survival.

Amid these crippling constraints, Shrivastava founded Dhonk, a unique social enterprise unit in Sawai Madhopur, around 130 km from Jaipur. The grassroots organisation works with local communities and ex-poachers in and around Ranthambore by training them in alternate livelihoods which in turn helps break the socio-economic cycle of dependence on poaching.

Shrivastava gave up a thriving career as a corporate dietician and relocated to the forest, thanks to her husband Dharmendra Khandal, a conservation biologist with Tiger Watch, an NGO working in Ranthambore.

“It was the late Fateh Singh Rathore, founder of the Ranthambore National Park and his family, who encouraged me to start Dhonk. They helped me realise that for any conservation effort to succeed, the local community must be involved,” she reflects.

The four objectives of Dhonk are: to provide free vocational training to the Mogya boys (a traditional hunter-gatherer tribe) to stop them from poaching; to provide alternative livelihood to the communities living around the park; to attain maximum tourism benefits to the ‘tiger’s neighbours’, and to contribute 10 per cent of the profits towards tiger conservation.

“The Dhonk tree gives shelter to the wildlife in these forests. Likewise, Dhonk provides shelter to the local communities,” Shrivastava says. Dhonk trains women and children in tailoring, block printing, embroidery, and helps sell their products, ranging from clothes, bags, purses, home furnishing, black pottery, baskets and toys. In the three years of its existence, Dhonk has worked with nearly 50 individuals. “By involving local artisans, Dhonk has helped preserve the rich and brilliant craft heritage of the region,” she explains.

Working with local communities, especially ex-poachers, is not easy. “They are erratic, disappear for months, spoil raw materials and are late in submissions which delays delivery to customers. They don’t want to change their old ways and often go back to poaching. Retention is an everyday challenge,” she rues.

However, Shrivastava is glad to be part of their empowerment process. “Education is a rarity here and that too only for boys. So when some of my employees began to send their girls to schools and colleges after working here, I was overwhelmed,” she says.

Shrivastava also addresses several other issues such as man-animal conflicts, responsible tourism, through her photo-blog “Ranthambore Tales” .

Awareness is the key to spreading and sustaining the love for wildlife. “Seeing a tiger is like a dream you’d want to hold on to. Each of us should do our bit to ensure their continued survival and well-being,” she signs off.

 
SOURCE : http://newindianexpress.com/magazine/article1510587.ece
 


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