I’m the water for which you thirst, the fire in which you burn, and the air that fans it. I’m the quiver of your lips, the throb in your belly, the blood in your cheeks and the stutter on your tongue.I’m your frown of frustration and squeal of delight.I’m the spring in your step, the…
Tag: Mirchani
The River Tigers
The ‘River Tigers’: The Mirchani female and her male cubs at Damnar Their gleaming eyes haunt the lonesome night, cutting like fire lanterns through the dark and balking at owls screeching to a silvery moon. Only stars bear witness to their opulent jaunt. By morning they snake back to their mythical abodes through bushes that…
Cry Baby
On 24 April 2011, evidence was presented that the only thing big about an adolescent male tiger is his body. Deep inside, he’s still a toddler, really. A little after half past five, M2, another handsome product of the Mirchahni School of Superstardom, crossed over to the grassland from the woods of Andhiyari. We thought…
Portfolio of a Princess
A Green-Carpet Welcome: When all hope was lost and chances seemed thinner than a shoestring, against all odds emerged from the woods this precocious girl of incredible audacity, crossed between a crowd of vehicles and walked out into the open where an exalted crowd of stunned onlookers gave her a rapturous green-carpet welcome on the…
In the Good Books
This picture is featured as a full-page spread in Valmik Thapar‘s latest book, “The Tiger – Soul of India,”published by Oxford University Press. I thank my naturalist Mukesh Burman and my driver Vikas for making the image possible.
Trick Boxing
In contrast to the glamorous sports of the human world, which erect stardom, fuel passions and ignite effigies, break backs with frayed tempers, weld relationships and engender scandals, halt countries and drive lucre under cobwebbed wooden tables, there is in this much pecuniary labyrinth yet a sport that is untouched by the wand of fame…
Indignation in Paradise
When a cheeky jackal paced up and down the opposite side of the lake by which B2 was resting, the latter’s reaction was not what could be described as “mild and passing” by any means. His reflexes were swift, the emergence of disgust to the face prompt and the action immediate. He rose with a…
The Light of the World
Just the other day I read astounded the report of a ‘dead’ baby “coming alive” after his mother put him to her bosom and told him her grand plans for his future. Doctors were suitably gobsmacked as they saw the very infant they had pronounced as being in an eternal rest hours before, coming…
She Grabs You!
I have always believed in the power of dreams. I dreamed in school, for example, snoozing in class and it saved me the uptake. I then dreamed straight through the laboratory periods at college and that did me a lot of good too; saved me the malodours. When my liaison with tigers…
Reverie at Tea
“Chug chug” rumbles the train. “Cluck cluck” protest the rails as the heavy wheels roll on them. “Right-ho, Jeeves” lies open beside. All is dark. There is a gentle zephyr. Restful. Nice, cool. There is a lull. Then there is light. Not bright, dim. Soothing, not intrusive. Somewhere in a forest. A bunch of stripes…
Entrée
The ride was penultimate, the time was short and my dubious record of having not made for my library even one image of a tiger crossing a clear jeep track scorned at me with a perfectly detestable air of surety about its continued reign on my haplessness. Mukesh’s intuitive style of work was my only…
Laissez-faire
Miss Mirchani Female Cub – an ardent ambassador of laissez-faire She saw, she came and she sat. Doesn’t exactly sound like a world-domineering conqueror’s magic trio of words, but that is exactly what makes cats, the equitable monarchs, so very special; they conquer the heart by merely being. After this Mirchani female cub’s initial enthusiasm…
Less Equal than Others?
This Republic Day, I wish that we can offer our magnificent felines, the symbol of our natural treasure, the same liberty and protection that we, the simian citizens of this country, enjoy, so that, amongst other things, they can cross roads without the fear of being mowed down by mindless juggernauts. Happy Republic Day!
TIGGA TALES 