Kishor Rithe

50 years ago today Indira Gandhi went to Haldighati to mark the 400th anniversary of the famed battle there that made Maharana Pratap inspirational and immortal. She addressed a huge public gathering there. On the morning flight to Udaipur she happened to come across the day’s edition of the Hindustan Times. The front page carried an unusual picture—that of the Great Indian Bustard that was facing near-extinction. There was a news report on page 4 that she also read. On landing in Udaipur she met with some bird enthusiasts led by Harsh Vardhan, then a member of the Rajasthan Wild Life Board. This sequence of events triggered the conservation programme for the Great Indian Bustard as well as steps to establish the sprawling Desert National Park near Jaisalmer and Barmer. The Great Indian Bustard is still critically endangered and continues to face several threats. But hopes have been kept alive since that flight to Udaipur on June 21, 1976. It had actually been proposed as the national bird by none other than the famed ornithologist Salim Ali in 1961. However two years later the Indian Board for Wild Life chaired by the erstwhile Maharaja of Mysore Jayachamarajendra Wadiyar had selected the peacock as the national bird for compelling historical, mythological, cultural, and religious reasons.