Experts jubilant over Hooghly gharial

Prithvijit Mitra
13 February 2009
The Times of India, (c) 2009 The Times of India Group

KOLKATA: The near-extinct gharials or long-snouted crocodiles have made a surprise return to the Hooghly after a gap of nearly 30 years. Identified as critically endangered by the International Union for Conservation of Nature, just 200 gharials were believed to be left in the wild.

At least a hundred gharials are now believed to be present in a 150-km stretch between Tribeni and Belun island in Burdwan, with the highest density along the river coast of Balagarh in Hooghly. An adult male can measure up to 20 feet in length while female gharials can grow up to 13 feet.

"In early November, reports of gharial sightings started coming in from Tribeni, Balagarh, Nabadwip, Patuli, Agradwep, Katwa and Belun. We sighted two at Kuntighat near Tribeni on November 29 and then at Katwa and Belun. It appears their number has crossed 100," said Tanmoy Ghosh, president of iRebel (Institute for Research on Ecology and Biodiversity), who is also a keen wildlife photographer.

"Gharials require sandy banks to lay eggs, which have either been taken up for cultivation or dug up. Due to their long snout, they get easily entangled in fishing nets and hundreds die thus," explained V K Yadav, conservator of forests, western circle.

"Fishing should be restricted or else, we will lose this population as well," said Pranabesh Sanyal, former director of Sundarban Tiger Reserve.

An NGO called Innovative India Tourism Pvt Ltd (IIT) and iREBEL have started a social movement in Belun called In Search of Gharials'. They have stopped fishing and the use of boats in two islands in the area till March to provide safe breeding grounds.

Gharials were last sighted in the Hooghly in the 1970s. More than a decade back, 5,000 gharials were released in the Ganga in Uttar Pradesh, but they failed to survive. Ever since, they were thought to be restricted to Chambal in Madhya Pradesh, Shone river in Rajasthan, Kartinia ghat in Uttaranchal and the Corbett National Park.

While some believe they have migrated from UP along the Ganga to the Hooghly through other smaller rivers like the Rupnarayan, others feel this could be the residual population that was believed to have been wiped out.