INDIANANGLER

Hi again,

All I say friends that take a poll from all the members and if all agree then create a fund for conservation / Environmental activities. Bagiganga, as you go to the spot mentioned above can you find out the time and procedure of the auction of these river stretches. Can you also contact the group you mentioned from Doon. I still have some contacts there and will try to find out more about this project.

Bops, rest assure that irrespective of east, west, north or south, in case of any effort to protect our environment you will always find me on the front.

Regards,

Ali..

A very noble thought indeed, Ali.
But it still needs a lot of in-depth thinking.
Angling for us is a sport, while fishing is a means of livelihood for the locals.
We may go to any extent to protect the environment, but if it affects the livelihood of the locals, they will never co-operate.
Take the example of Powai itself - in spite of MSAA staff being present round the clock, they still cannot prevent poaching.
Or what we have read on this forum about Jungle Lodges who claim to be helpless to prevent dynamiting activities in the Cauvery ... that too in the stretches under their "protection" !!

The locals should be involved in such a way that they find it more lucrative to save the mahseer than to kill it - then and only then would such efforts bear fruit.

Hi Ali,
If you read the post in this conservation forum, called Bangalore meeting part one - environmental group, it should make things a bit clearer. It will take ten minutes to read, but sets out how things should work both locally and on a national basis.

I'm working on a draft letter to send to various important people, as soon as it is ready, I'll email it to everyone I know with an interest, so they can sign it and pass it on, both to those important people and anyone else they know who may be interested to do the same.

Basically, the idea involves all local groups, like Clean and Green in Bangalore, and anyone else with an interest in the waterside environment, accepting a local group to oversee the activities and be the voice that deals with State Government and other bodies.
There would be North, Central and South Indian groups, possibly along the lines of WASI, and a National Body called the Indian Freshwater Foundation.
The North, Central and South bodies would look to build links between smaller groups and gain experience of dealing with State level government, Forestry Depts, etc. The Indian Freshwater Foundation would use education, mass media and dealings with National Government to raise awareness of the issues.

It will be a long, hard slog, but until someone actually gets on and does something, there will only ever be small groups sitting moaning and eventually getting pretty dissillusioned.

As an example, Sunder Raj, the Manager of one of the JLR camps, has been working to involve local poachers, as was discussed earlier on this thread. He really wants someone to start these groups happening, as he said at our meeting: "I've heard these things so many times, but nobody actually does anything!"

Time for someone to actually do something, is it going to be you?

And to anyone else reading this post:
Is it going to be you? Or will you sit back waiting for someone else to do the hard work and moan about it when no one does?