Saving whale sharks

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Spiritual guru's word saves hundreds of whale shark in Gujarat

Sreenivas Janyala Posted online: Tuesday, January 23, 2007 at 0000 hrs Print

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Email<http://www.indianexpress.com/story/21555.html#> Morari

Bapu's campaign helps enforce law to save the fish; hunted, they fetch

almost Rs 1 lakh each

 

Veraval's Kharwa fishermen cut their nets to let go a whale shark off the

Gujarat coast. *Express*

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*VERAVAL, JANUARY 22:* For a fisherman, nothing is perhaps more painful than

to let go of a big catch with his own hands, especially if it happens to be

a 30-ft whale shark that would fetch at least Rs 80,000.

 

But that's exactly what fishermen of Saurashtra are doing — often cutting

their expensive nets and releasing the whale shark they once butchered by

the hundreds as the gentle giants came to breed in the warm waters of the

Arabian Sea.

 

On the face of it, behind this change of heart is a ban on hunting whale

sharks. But the fishermen couldn't have cared less for the law if not for

one man's word of faith, Morari Bapu's.

 

One day in 2003, the guru ventured into the sea off Dwarka and blessed a

whale shark entangled in a net and said he wished the creature was left

alone. The killings stopped almost immediately.

 

This was two years after the Central government ban on killing whale shark

in 2001, and the forest department was struggling to implement it. Every

year, at least 250 whale sharks were killed along the Saurashtra coast.

 

But Morari Bapu, famous for his Ram kathas, knew that in spite of a large

following among the fishing communities even his word was not enough. He

decided to combine his preaching with the strict laws for whale shark

protection to convince the fishermen against hunting.

 

" Whale sharks come to Saurashtra coast to give birth and end up getting

brutally killed. I reasoned with the fishermen by comparing the whale shark

with a daughter who comes home to give birth. Instead of death we should

give them respect,'' the soft-spoken guru told The Indian Express.

 

The whale shark, protected and classified as a vulnerable species world

wide, migrates from as far as the waters of Australia and Mexico to give

birth in the warmth of the Arabian Sea along the Saurashtra coast. They are

often found just 1-2 km off the fishing ports of Veraval, Dwarka, Diu,

Mangrol and Porbandar.

 

The rare guests were hunted in the hundreds every year by fishermen who

modify their normal fishing boats, arming them with harpoons weighing 8 to

10 kg and ropes tied to half a dozen empty plastic barrels. " The worst part

is they would start cutting it alive. The waters of Veraval and Bhidiya

harbour used to turn red, " says K Babariya, Veraval range forest officer.

 

Agents of fish processing and export firms would pay up to Rs 1 lakh for a

40-foot whale shark weighing 8 to 10 tonnes. Its fins, liver from which oil

is extracted, and meat has great demand and fetch a heavy price in the

international market. In the coastal fishing towns, it is said that if a

fisherman netted two whale sharks in a season he could afford to sit at home

the rest of the year.

 

As the whale shark fetch such a huge price, I felt there was jealousy among

a majority of fishermen. Some were angry too. That is when I felt I should

tell them about the strict laws against killing this whale, " Morari Bapu

said.

 

" Till then I did not know why and under what laws the whale shark was

protected. I learnt a little bit, like the maximum jail sentence if one is

caught, why the whale shark is an endangered species, and started spreading

awareness, he said.

 

" A couple of corporate houses also approached me and I joined their

efforts. " Besides the International Fund for Animal Welfare and Wildlife

Trust of India, Tata Chemicals and Gujarat Heavy Chemicals have also joined

the campaign to save the rare breed.

 

" Morari Bapu being a respected spiritual leader, his word has provided us a

positive inputs in the campaign to save the whale shark, " said Pradeep

Khanna, chief conservator of forest (wildlife).

 

The holy man's words have indeed tamed greed. The powerful Kharwa community,

which dint care for the laws, has also fallen in line. " We used to get good

money but after the ban and with Morari Bapu appealing, most fishermen have

stopped catching that fish, " said Narsinh Dholki, president of the Kharwa

Association. The Kharwas worship whales, which are mammals, as an

incarnation of Lord Hanuman but since the whale shark is classified as a

fish they have been hunting it without religious qualms.

 

Several fishermen who cut their nets that often costs up to Rs 10,000 to

release trapped whale sharks have been felicitated by Morari Bapu on several

occasions.

 

However, it's not all faithful submission. During a bad season, tempers

flare in the fishing communities. " Morari Bapu's preachings are fine but we

are becoming poorer by the day, " says Laxmansinh Ramsinh, the Veraval Boat

Association leader.

 

He says it is just a matter of time before fishermen's patience runs out and

they start illegally killing the shark whale again. But the religious leader

has his own plans to up the campaign: he is holding a public meeting in

Veraval on February 17 to campaign against the killing of the whale shark.

 

*janyala.srinivas *