FRONT PAGE | Sunday, November 29, 2009 | Email | Print | 
Jatinga’s ‘suicidal’ birds driven by geography or device?
Sanat K Chakraborty | Guwahati
Sociology is at the root of many myths, or so say the wise. Jatinga, the gorgeous forested valley in south Assam’s North Cachar Hill, is famous for its legend of ‘bird suicides’.
However, today’s better informed generations explain that birds don’t always commit suicide but rather fall prey to forces of nature and human nature, above all.
Many among them are engaged in an effort to put a stop to the practice of an age-old village custom here that they feel is the real source of the phenomenon. They want to wipe out the curse of Jatinga valley — where birds come to die!
“Well, I grew up with this fascinating fairy tale,” says Sylvia Suchiang, a native of the village and a schoolteacher at Haflong. Nestled on a spur in the Haflong ridge, overlooking the imposing Borial mountain range, Jatinga was founded by her great grandparents over a century ago and is equally known for its orange orchards and betel plantations, she informs. Sylvia believes it was one Dr S Sengupta from Zoological Survey of India, who invented this ingenious theory of birds ‘committing suicide en masse’ 30 years ago following his visit to the valley.
Even though this fantastic story of ‘bird suicide’ was nothing but a myth, “this gentleman did a splendid job for this nondescript village by creating enormous curiosity among ornithologists, media and tourists, both from home and abroad! But it is time we put the records straight,” she says, “even though I am no ornithologist, and have no expertise to comment on the so-called suicidal behaviour by birds.”
For her, and many of those who grew up in this valley, this behaviour is the direct result of a rather bloody bird-trapping game that is a favourite pastime of the village folk and they bear witness to this fact. Sylvia and a small group of young nature lovers have now been trying to create awareness against this cruel village sport and try and transform it into an enjoyable ‘bird-watching’ event in the valley.
“The conservation ideas are slowing catching,” claims Bankim Haflongbar, who is a passionate member of a local nature group, Spectrum. Plans are afoot to develop the area as a bird sanctuary or an ecotourism site, he says. This would not only discourage killing of birds but also open new economic avenues for the local youth.
But how did all this 'indigenous sport' begin, in the first place?
“I guess it just happened by chance,” Sylvia explains. “In the olden days, there would be a bonfire in people’s courtyards and god knows from where birds in small groups would come down and hover over the fire,” she recalls, narrating how then the young boys and girls then would try to catch them.
“We all participated in the murderous game, trying to strike the birds down with bamboo poles as they came closer to the fire or any other bright light,” Sylvia says remorsefully. This eventually turned into a great local sport! In fact, there used to be competition among youth to proclaim who could capture the highest number and variety of birds,” she says.
Later, people, including officials from Haflong and local youth, began to use brighter Petromax lamps at various places in the valley to trap birds. Birds, both migratory and resident, would fly down in large groups, even in hundreds, towards the light and fall prey to this inhuman indulgence.
Every year, hundreds of birds would be trapped and killed. Most of these birds would end up at the dinner table. These included birds belonging to over 50 species comprising the Malay or tiger bittern, black bittern, Indian Rudy kingfisher, pond heron and egret among others.
Asked to speak on the stories of bird suicides, Sylvia says: “It seems this unusual behaviour of birds occurs during the months between August and October-November under certain inexplicable atmospheric conditions.” It happens on foggy, moonless nights with winds blowing from south to north over the narrow valley, she says.
“Another peculiar thing about these birds is that,” says a local youth, “they don’t accept any food given to them and die in the process. So villagers feel it’s better to eat them than let them die.”
However, the stories of cruel treatment to birds at Jatinga has drawn widespread concern from various circles, including animal rights activist Maneka Gandhi, who shot an angry letter to the then DC of NC Hills asking the administration to stop the bloody sport.
“It was a right thing to do,” Sylvia, who had earlier volunteered as a member of the Jatinga Bird Watching Club to run awareness campaigns in collaboration with forest department against this century-old tribal practice, says.
“You like it or not, the mystery over this peculiar bird phenomenon endures,” she says, wondering why they still choose to fly through the same passage over the ‘valley of death’ even as hundreds of them die year after year.
A few years back a British bird expert named Robert Lang had spent about a month at Jatinga to study the phenomenon. “He stayed in our house at Jatinga,” Sylvia says and wishes that Lang had sent her a copy of his report.
She now hopes to set up a bird-watching facility where anyone can come, stay, study and document the bird phenomenon. There should be a bird rescue, care and rehabilitation centre in Jatinga — just like the one at Kaziranga for wild animals — so that the birds, the hapless victims of the mysterious atmospheric riddle, could be treated and then freed in the wild.
“This is a good idea,” admits conservator of forest Bikash Brahma, who has mooted a slew of proposals to promote Jatinga as a unique bird-watching site. One of the ideas is to build an open air highrise bird observatory at Jatinga. Special lights would be mounted at certain points closer to the observatory from where one can closely watch birds.
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