E-Paper
Wildbuzz | Morality of human brutality
The civet is labelled as a ‘Kabr bijjoo’ or ‘Murda khor’, ie, one with a proclivity for digging graves to relish decaying flesh; It is a nocturnal creature whose eyes shine like lamps when a flashlight is shone on it
Some wild creatures get trapped in popular lores and cultural mores which are not based on a scientific understanding of their lives. They are given the proverbial “bad name” and then it is morally easier to deal brutally with them. One such stigmatised ‘caste’ is the Asian or Common Palm civet.
A magnificent specimen was rescued from Banur (Punjab) on Wednesday morning in a horrific, paralysed condition. Its spine was fractured, it was suffering from multiple haemorrhages and it had a brute of a wound under the tail. It died at Chhatbir Zoo on Thursday-Friday night. Either the creature had been bashed with a blunt instrument or it had suffered a vehicle hit.
The civet is labelled as a ‘Kabr bijjoo’ or ‘Murda khor’, ie, one with a proclivity for digging graves to relish decaying flesh. It is a nocturnal creature whose eyes shine like lamps when a flashlight is shone on it. Though the actual diet of the civet is fruits, tubers, birds, rodents etc as also scavenging, it is dealt with brutally on discovery since it is misconceived as a ‘nocturnal robber of human remains’.
The spread of scientific knowledge and conservation awareness has hardly eroded such cultural fallacies. Ignorant people tend to mistake a civet for either a cat, a mini-leopard or a cross between a mongoose and a cat. It is neither --- it belongs to the family of viverridae.
Social media has fostered the odious manufacture of ‘reels’ of creatures illegally captured and stunts performed on them to earn ‘likes, shares and views’. Labels such as ‘Murda khor’ come in handy to attract the eyeballs of multitudes of idle minds milking low-cost internet for porn and titillating spectacles. Social media is rife with captured cobras in manipulated videos/photos flashing an alleged magic stone in the head.
Smaller creatures such as civets, monitor lizards, porcupines, etc, which lack the VVIP charisma and protection afforded to say, tigers, face another assault. Poachers hunt them with virtual impunity and flash their incriminatory acts via reels. In fact, if a creature is observed in a vulnerable condition and it spreads on social media, poachers such as a section of Sikligars and Bangalas are quicker to the spot and vanish with the bush meat before arrival of official/NGO rescue teams.
The fruits of Kashmir terrorism
On Monday an image scarred the mind habituated to associating Kashmiri apples with beauty and sublime taste. It was of a terrorist affiliated to the Lashkar-e-Taiba, Amir Ahmed Dar, of Shopian, who had been eliminated in Guddar, Kulgam. Dar’s body lay slumped under a tree of apples blushed in Kashmir pink. Wild flowers possessed of an elfin charm stirred in the breeze, but the grass was stained scarlet with blood.
Another wasted young life of Kashmir, whose people nature endows with effortless beauty and cheeks the colour of apples. In another time, Dar could have been proposing marriage to the love of his life in an apple orchard run through with merry brooks whose music tugs the strings of folk instruments.
Dar’s image epitomised the Kashmir tragedy, of paradise lost, of profound beauty juxtaposed with the spilling innards of violence. Emperor Jahangir’s description of Kashmir, “If there is Paradise on earth, it is this, it is this, it is this,” seemed lost on the young man, whose motivations lay in the belief of courting virgins in a mythical paradise of afterlife. Countless deaths have not dissuaded young men from marching Kashmir to a hell upon earth.
A Pakistani terrorist, Rehman, was also shot. His body lay like a hunted man-eater in the deep bush. Subedar Perbhat Gaur of 10 PARA (SF) and Lance Naik Narender Sindhu of 9 Rashtriya Rifles made the supreme sacrifice. Terrorists took advantage of dense Guddar forests, rain and mist to ambush troops. They had exploited verdant forest to conceal an underground hideout.
Had an apple fallen on the terrorist, it could hardly be termed a Newtonian initiation to scientific enlightenment. Apples of the Kashmir orchard of blood and gore could scarce draw association with the Biblical imagery of creation: Eve, Adam, serpent and the forbidden apple. The other iconic ‘Apple’ of human history --- the enterprise of Steve Jobs ---- vividly contrasts with the economic regression that terrorism and inept governments have inflicted upon Kashmir.
vjswild2@gmail.com
