Chidi Kho Trek & The Jungle Book
I
Chidi Kho Trek
January 3rd
week. Long weekend. The morning was chilly as expected at this time of the year
at Bhopal, but the modest fog lifted in an hour. A motley group of fifty trekkers
– young and enthusiastic, old but sportive, serving officers and pensioners, homemakers
relieved for a day from the humdrum of minding home and hearth, and a few kids,
the youngest still a little shy of four – drove seventy kilometres to Chidi Kho
Bird Sanctuary, most of them reaching before nine, and a few soon thereafter.
Bhagavati
Prasad Sharma, a short stocky man in his early forties, was a part-time guide, since
there were visitors only in the weekends in winter, and hardly any in scalding summer
and on weekdays. He was quite excited and a little flustered to guide such
a large group which included several veteran forest officers. Before
commencement of the trek, he assembled the group under the sprawling banyan
tree, and delivered a little welcome speech.
‘Jai
Raghunath Ji ki! That’s how we begin any enterprise or activity in these parts.
The ruler of Narsinghgarh never called himself king. Raghunath Ji was the King,
and the Ruler his subservient Dewan!
I grew up in
the nearby village, this forest has nourished me, and I owe a debt to it. I’m a
guide because of my deep attachment to this forest,’ he said with a flourish,
and would have said more about himself but a senior forest officer cut him
short, ‘Enough about yourself. Why don’t you tell a little about the flora and
fauna, in say two or three minutes, before we proceed with the trek?’
The trekkers
had already casually glanced at the foldable, detailed colour brochure about
the sanctuary, and were similarly impatient with the guide’s briefing. No one was
in the mood for a lecture during a fun trip on a holiday. Each one picked up a
complimentary green cap, a slender bamboo staff for support during climb up and
down, a small water bottle, and climbed the little hillock.
‘It’s rather
late to sight animals, but you’d, of course, feel their presence,’ said the
guide, forewarning the trekkers not to feel disappointed.
It was more
a leisurely walk than a trek, for the little climb at the beginning up to
Chacko Point was modest, and the climb down the hill at the end was no
challenge even for the senior citizens, most of the five kilometre trek being a
flat terrain on the rocky hill with sparse vegetation – several varieties of
jungle grass, and a scattering of palash, khair, mahua, saja, and amaltas trees
– sturdy survivors in the tropical, deciduous forest.
The trekkers
had walked less than a hundred metres when the guide stopped and pointed to a
little heap in the middle of the dust track. ‘That’s sai poop. Porcupine in
English. Plenty of them in this sanctuary. They are nocturnal, rarely seen
during the day,’ he said.
A little
ahead, he pointed to diagonal marks on the bark of a tree near the trail. ‘Those
marks are by sambar. After shedding old antlers, they get new ones covered in a
velvety sheath. They rub and scratch on tree trunks, remove the sheath, and get
shiny new antlers.’
Further ahead,
there were two or three dumps by panthers, and many more by nilgais – both the
carnivore and the herbivore performing a kind of relay race to win the prize
for the most markings in the middle of the trek trail.
Both animals
mark their territory by poop and urine, said a senior forest official, and then
they spotted a substantial heap where nilgais had been pooping for weeks, and
on top of which was a fresh dump by an angry panther. This is rather unusual,
he said, for the cats including the big cats typically paw the earth to make a
clearing, defecate, and then cover it with soil. This panther chose to dump
directly on top of the communal heap of nilgais to send them a clear message –
Go elsewhere, my territory is not your toilet!
At most
places, the panthers had not covered their droppings with soil since the
terrain was rocky, and there wasn’t enough loose soil. The angry panther had scrupulously
avoided pawing the nilgai dump. It was infra dig for him, maybe.
At one spot,
a panther had pawed the earth, urinated, and the soil was still damp. She was
here early this morning, maybe even two hours earlier, said the guide.
On the rocky
terrain sloping to north-west, amidst Saja trees stood a Kulu tree, rather
forlorn; though not as towering and impressive as the wizened, imperious one
standing tall on top of a rock near the curve where the stone steps led to Rani
Roopmati’s seven-storied, dilapidated mahal in the Ratapani National Park, an
hour’s drive to south of Bhopal. ‘It’s called the Ghost Tree since its pale,
peeling bark glows under moonlight.’ Often leafless for over six months, Sterculia
urens, a deciduous tree native to India, has smooth, white bark which
allows it to photosynthesize without leaves.
Jungle rats
had dug tunnels, created a maze of routes with multiple exits to escape snakes
and other predators. A rock lizard was sunning herself, and refused to budge
when an inconsiderate trekker tried to scare her away with a slender stick. She
was intrigued, but not afraid of the visitor – clearly an intruder.
A visit to Dheeng
Dev cave - midway of the trek – was optional. The presiding deity of this
forlorn shelter was fondly named by the locals as Dheeng Dev (dheeng- mountain,
dev-deity). But it was not for the faint-hearted or those with creaking knees.
It required a little bit of mountaineering, and the risk of a fall could not be
ruled out. One had to descend and climb back using a thick nylon rope wrapped
around sturdy tree trunks and stumps, with a helper providing a hand to those
who needed it.
A Jain cave
with a headless Tirthankar. The sculpture was a single piece carved out of
rock, and plunderers may have beheaded it for sale. A student of history
spotted the ratna (gem) sculpted on the chest. A Tirthankar, no doubt, she
affirmed.
As though
the beheading wasn’t enough, semi-literate hooligans had scrawled their names
on the headless torso, adding insult to injury. Mahavir Jaina taught of a new
way of life – a new religion – with non-violence as its central tenet. Their
followers carved statues of the twenty-four Tirthankars so that their teaching
may be remembered by the future generations. The hooligans had put their
signature on the statue hoping for their two-minute taste of renown and immortality!
Karbatia
cave – a slender cleavage of about fifty metres between two tall rocks - could
be negotiated only by walking sideways; scary, and not for the claustrophobic.
The forest
guard shared the local folklore. ‘In Sat Yug, the Devi temple was constructed in
a single night by Vishwakarma - the divine architect; a rakshas came to plunder Devi’s ornaments, but
when the Goddess raised her trishul to strike, he fled by prising apart the mountain.
He must have been blessed with a boon to perform such a miraculous feat!
Tucked away
at the far end of the Devi hills are rock cave paintings, one of several such
caves on other hills across this region.
A local
guide, possibly untrained and unqualified, interpreted the paintings – a fight
between a Raja and a Rani from a rival kingdom, caged birds, and their release.
King and his horse painted in red, the Queen on a camel painted in yellow.
Local folklore, maybe.
II
The Jungle Book
Chidi Kho Wildlife Sanctuary lies in a landscape of restraint. This is not a forest of
towering sal or uninterrupted teak, but a mixed deciduous mosaic—grassland
edges, scrub, scattered trees – happily thriving in the rocky terrain with
modest to sparse rains. There is a large lake, and several water-holes in the
valleys providing shelter and food to the animals.
Here, animal
presence is not proclaimed loudly. It is inferred.
A rubbed trunk,
a dung heap placed with intention, a spray of urine—these are the sanctuary’s
punctuation marks. To read them is to understand how different species claim
space without fences or flags.
A Journal
The jungle
is not silent. It is simply written in a language that most people have
forgotten how to read.
To the
casual visitor with a sense of entitlement to sight at least some of the listed
fauna, a forest is a green mass of trees, shrubs and creepers, calls of unseen animals
and birds, and the occasional movement in the undergrowth. It appears
mysterious, even inscrutable. But to a trained trekker, or forester, the jungle
is not a mystery at all. It is a journal, constantly being written, revised,
and annotated by its inhabitants.
Every animal
that passes through it leaves an entry.
A Logbook
A forest
track is a logbook. It records who passed, when, and in what condition.
A set of
fresh pugmarks tells you - a leopard crossed here at dawn; it was walking, not
stalking; it was probably a male; and it was heading toward the watercourse.
Hoof prints
near the same spot reveal that a herd of chital passed earlier. Their tracks
overlap, the soil churned by many hooves. The forest floor, like a logbook,
notes the sequence of arrivals and departures.
A skilled
tracker reads time in dust - sharp edges mean recent passage; softened edges
suggest a few hours; wind-blurred prints indicate a day or more.
The Ledger of Ownership
The jungle
also keeps a ledger—a record of claims, boundaries, and rights.
A leopard’s
scrape on a forest path is an entry in this ledger. So is the scent mark of a
jackal on a rock, or the dung heap of a dominant nilgai bull.
These are
not aggressive declarations. They are courteous notifications:
“I was here.
I use this route. Let us avoid unnecessary conflict.”
The ledger
is maintained not by fences or patrols, but by scent and sign.
The Gazetteer of the Landscape
A gazetteer
describes places—their character, inhabitants, and features. The jungle, too,
maintains such a record.
Certain
clues tell you about the place itself - Porcupine quills near rocky outcrops
suggest nearby burrows; scratched mahua trees mark the presence of sloth bears;
repeated alarm calls of langurs forewarn a predator’s movement.
Without a
map, without a GPS, a forest guard can describe the land simply by reading its
signs. The jungle has already written the gazetteer; he merely recites it.
Why Most People Cannot Read It
The casual
visitor sees only the obvious - a tree, a pile of dung, a patch of mud. But the
trained eye sees - species, age, direction, intention, and often, the story
that links them.
Reading the
jungle requires appreciation of the eco-system as a living organism, keen
observation, patience, practice, and a willingness to look down at the ground
as often as up at the canopy.
It is not
unlike learning an ancient script. At first it is meaningless, then slowly the
letters emerge, and finally whole sentences begin to speak.
What makes
the jungle’s journal remarkable is its honesty. It records facts. The forest
records everything without bias or exaggeration. It is a perfect, incorruptible
archive.
The Jungle as Author
The jungle
is always writing, but it never speaks aloud. It expects its readers to come
prepared—with quiet steps, sharp eyes, and a patient mind.
The forest
does not hide its secrets. It only writes them in a script that must be
learned.
The Jungle Book
A good
forester, tracker, or trekker is not a conqueror of the jungle, but its reader.
He walks
slowly, head slightly bowed, as if reading a long manuscript. Every few steps
he pauses, notices a faint scrape, a pellet heap, a disturbed patch of dust. To
him, these are not random signs but sentences in a familiar language.
By the end
of the walk, he can narrate what happened in the forest during the previous
night.
The Jungle
Book is revealed to the trained, perceptive reader.
***
