“Since childhood I was curious to know about animals. While kids of my age would play with each other, I would observe and play with animals and birds. I secretly used to keep snakes, lizards, scorpions at my house and my parents never used to know about it as these reptiles don’t make any noise. For nights I would observe their behavior and note down every small activity and movement they would do. I had made charts, diagrams and structures which would help me understand animals in a more better way.

One fine day my parents found out everything and also I wasn’t aware about the Wildlife Protection Act which didn’t allow us to keep certain species of animals at home. Gradually time passed by but my passion for wildlife animals still remained the same but I didn’t have proper counselling who could guide me to choose a field that could help me convert my passion for wildlife animals into profession, so, I went with my second-best guess and entered in the field of computers. Two years into the graduation and I realized that this is not where my heart lies. I left the graduation and started working with a wildlife animal organisation in the city for which I used to volunteer earlier. I started working in the city as a wildlife rehabilitator and conducted many rescue operations. I specialized in working with crocodilians and venomous snakes.

My passion for reptiles and animals took me to United States to Thailand, Sri Lanka to Bhutan and many other countries. I have also worked with many international as well as national organisations. Over the period of years, I have worked with more than 100 species and have rescued more than 6000 reptiles.

There has been this one time when I was very nervous as I had catch Gharials from the river Chambal for a research project and fit radio transmitters on them to monitor their activity. I found one 17.6 feet long Gharial, which was a huge reptile and an endangered species and one of the largest crocodilian in the world. I caught him and brought him safely on land and then we fitted transmitter on him and then safely freed him back in the river without any scratch on his body. This project was one of the most nerve wrecking project of my life.

Any Message?
There is a huge need to understand that we share this earth with many other species. We should learn to co-exist with them and make sure that they too get proper environment to live.”

Story: Soham Mukherjee

Story By – Humans Of Amdavad | Pray Bavishi