#Part2 #BagahaStory – The #Sequel
Work and Adventure
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| Work and Adventure |
Adventurous
Times spent in the Diaras and the Jungles along the Narayani
As promised earlier, I am now ready
to narrate further some more stories from my tenure as SP, Bagaha. As the
series would continue further with your esteemed feedback, readers still
unfamiliar with the plot, terrain and topography of Bagaha, where I enjoyed
some of the most adventurous times of my life as a young Superintendent of
Police, are advised to read my earlier blog at http://copinbihar.blogspot.in/2016/12/the-december-of-2006.html.
I had then mentioned that the stories from the initial days in Bagaha would
soon be continued. In fact upon being forced by repeated requests from various
anxious readers to narrate the complete story, I had to send a link containing a
complete brief of the happenings during my stint in Bagaha which was available
at http://copinbihar.blogspot.in/2016/08/a-story-written-in-december-2012-from.html.
But for now, as the stories would sequentially continue, I would be regularly
sharing some of my adventurous experiences in the pristine jungles and wild
diaras of Bagaha. Here I am recollecting some out of many adventurous tales
which were experienced between December, 2006 and June, 2007.
Incredible Bagaha !
To start with, I must make the reader
recollect that Bagaha is still home to one of the best surviving forests in
northern India, and here one is sure to encounter a diversity of wildlife
seldom seen elsewhere. But, these beautiful forests of Bihar were hardly
popular as a tourist destination in the days when rickety roads coupled with
the activities of ‘dasyu’ (meaning dacoit) criminal gangs and Maoists made the
rare chance visitor tremble with fear. Anyone visiting then and moving without
any police escort or local knowledge must have surely felt that one was more
likely to encounter dreaded creatures hailing from the dasyu gangs also often
called as ‘Jungle parties’, which engaged themselves in kidnapping victims for
ransom, rather than those seemingly innocent and beautiful ones living in the
wild in their own natural territory. And the fear was certainly not without
reason in the jungles believed to have always been inhabited by dasyus, who sharing
a common space with the wild residents had been a part of the feared ecosystem since
as old as the immemorial times of the dasyu turned into the great sage Valmiki,
author of the Ramayana, believed to be hailing from the same jungles.
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| In the Forest near Ganauli |
Dense as they still were, the jungles
had also since around the late nineties additionally been infested with
Maoists, who in the new race for dominance in the forest areas often struggled
with the regularly inhabiting dasyus and posed a severe threat to regular
police movement, as they occasionally and in a planned manner had been
attacking the police or forest personnel and installations using guerilla
tactics. The Maoist presence in the jungles added a new dimension to the challenges
before the police, who happened to be the most frequent visitors being
compulsed by duties to continuously chase the ever changing hideouts of the
dasyus and often in search of kidnapped victims. The Police in those days had
to make very careful and tactical moves inside the forests, being always on a high
alert, since in the absence of regular tourists, any vehicular movement within
the jungles could well be deemed as being made by the police who were the exclusive
tourists of the jungles. Also, under ever-growing influence of the Maoists,
these dense jungles always teeming with wildlife were now gradually becoming less
inhabited by criminals, for whom the major hub had now increasingly shifted to the
vast diara lying across the Gandak. The Gandak is traditionally called as the
‘Narayani’ on account of it being the seat of the Puranic legend of the fight
between the pious Elephant and the crocodile, which originating at its banks
near Valmikinagar finally ended at Sonpur, near Patna, with the rescue of the
elephant by the Lord Narayan Vishnu himself.
Life in the Diaras of the Narayani
I have earlier described at length
the peculiar topography of the police district where the Gandak (Narayani)
seemed to divide the district into two distinct parts. While north of the river
contained Hills and dense forests, the southern part with several meandering
streams along with the main river encompassed vast stretches of sands called ‘diaras’.
In these vast diaras which were characterized by growing tall grasses and
sturdy shrubs amidst sandy stretches and mud pools, there were large cultivable
lands with small huts where lived farmers thriving upon sugarcane along with
other crops and cattle wealth. The permanent residents of the diara happened to
be often very peculiar since most of them had almost never received any sort of
education in their lives, which quite carefree revolved only around the moods
of the river and their daily chores, the nature of which changed cyclically
with the seasons.
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| The Narayani at Valmikinagar |
Even as the inhabiting faces kept
changing with time along with the ever changing courses of the river and the
cyclical climatic changes, the basic characteristics of life in the diara
seemed to persist timelessly without any typical change. Such was the virtual
isolation from modern learning that hardly any grown up man I encountered in
the diara could ever recall the date on which he was born, or even the date or
year of the present day. A man whose name I still recall as one Uma Yadav appeared
to be in his late fifties, but upon being asked about his age smiled innocently
and shyly answered that he must have crossed thirty or forty since his son had
also been married recently. Also, almost isolated from electricity, Television
and other modern communication till as late as 2006, all he seemed to be
concerned was about his daily chores, buffaloes and survival in a land infested
with the gangs who would regularly bring in guests from outside (read
kidnapping!) and ask him for favours like food etc. and shelter, which could
not be denied in the circumstances due to the possible threat that they posed.
The Police for him must have been like an occasional visitor who at times came
on seemingly tourist like trips in the area and threatened him to not shelter
or support the gangs.
All diara residents had been
similarly used to this for years. In some villages where the criminals would
have had just left, they would run away the moment they saw the police
approaching fearing that the police may catch hold of some of them in order to
inquire about the whereabouts of the gang members, who later would seek revenge
had the police even inadvertently proceeded in the right direction despite
having been effort-fully misguided by the poor informant. I felt it the most at
one Nainaha village, which was used like a virtual permanent camp by the daysu
gangs being located almost in the centre of the vast and inaccessible diara. The
village was located at a distance of only about 10 kms from Ratwal village
approachable by metaled road, but was reached only after the vehicles drove
through a river channel and into the vast sandy expanses which had either
sugarcane or tall grasses and other shrubs growing profusely upon them. During my
visit to Nainaha just 2 or 3 days after the major police raid of the diara, all
the villagers on seeing the police approaching in vehicles, simply ran away
from their homes leaving behind them unattended burning stoves and their other
properties. They largely distrusted the police which always threatened them
with dire circumstances for being shelterers of the dasyus, and often detained
them for questioning about the latest activities of the dasyus. I then often had
wondered about their peculiar fear of the police and support for the gangs
which led to such deemed pitiful existence of theirs, but soon understood that
their peculiar behavior was shaped so since they knew that the police would
soon leave their territory, while the gangs were there to stay and could not be
afforded to be antagonized.
Soon after the first major police
raid of the diara, a makeshift Police camp had already been set up in a remote
diara settlement known as ‘Bauk Baitha ka Ghotha’, the name of which symbolised
the hutment of a person named as ‘Bauk Baitha’ i.e. ‘dumb or foolish Baitha’,
who may have lived there sometime in the remote past and about whom no one presently
seemed to have any idea. The particular camp was set up especially to oversee
the sugarcane planted in the lands under illegal occupation of the dasyu gangs
and further in order to prevent their being harvested by the gang members and to
organize their proper harvesting under police supervision for deposition of the
proceeds thereof into the Government treasury.
Police Station Visits were also Adventurous
!
After the first major raid of the
diara, my next target was to complete a visit to all the police stations, 17 in
number along with their outposts and located in distant and different parts of
the region. Visiting some of the Police stations was an adventure in itself. To
reach one particular Gobrahiya PS, one had to cross not less than 45 streams meandering
in between the Himalayan foothills if one was proceeding from Bagaha or
Valmikinagar side. The police vehicles would cross the river with the waters
still fully flowing based upon chosen routes at places where the river sand was supposed to be firm
enough to allow fordability, and which were marked by earlier ‘tyre marks’ of
vehicles which had crossed earlier.
These routes along the streams kept on changing as they were regularly washed
out after every heavy rain and also during flash floods which could arrive any
moment due to rains in the upper mountains, even as no sign of rain could be
seen in the vicinity. The streams took at least one full day to become fordable
again after a good rain and in the circumstance of one getting stuck in this
part of the district during rain, there was no other way but to pray to the
rain god which we soon realized as I would subsequently narrate about the times
when once travelling on an inspection trip, I had to camp for three consecutive
nights at Gobrahiya rest house dependent only upon the frugal provisions which
could be procured from the small village as it rained continuously for about 2
days.
Another set of 4 Police stations was
located on the other side of the river from Bagaha, which could either be
reached by crossing via boats and thereafter walking for miles or by travelling
via the sole bridge at Paniyahwa which connected Bagaha to areas of Kushinagar
district in Uttar Pradesh where too the roads though ‘pucca’ and recently
carpeted had some basic fault in engineering and gave a very bumpy ride even at
moderate speed. In any case, it took no less than three hours to reach Piprasi
or Dhanha PS, while reaching Thakraha by road used to consume four hours and often
made one feel as if on a visit to some god forbidden territory which had not
seen the light of development or even electricity due to its being physically
located in an almost inaccessible part of Bihar, even as it was connected to a
well-developed marketplace in the neighbouring Uttar Pradesh. The need of a
bridge which could connect Bagaha with the other side near Dhanha was very much
felt, and later I was happy to learn that the project was soon taken up by the
Government after I had left the district and that its existence today is a
reality. Valuable for the economy and connectivity greatly, the only damage that
the construction of the bridge may have caused would have been to the fragile
ecosystem in the diaras through which it must have passed. These diaras near
Nainaha and Ratwal were the most pristine ones and contained a huge
biodiversity. Crocodiles and Aligators could be spotted in large numbers along
with freshwater river dolphins which made the otherwise calm surroundings very
lively with a lot of them always erupting from different locations in the river.
Times spent with Visitors, Informers
and Friends
As I roamed around the district in
the initial days, there was no routine which could be followed and as it often
depended on the circumstances encountered enroute and the distance away from
the headquarters, the days were quite tiring and often I could return only by
late night or even in the very next morning in case of a night stay out. I was
soon getting used to the schedule and so were the large number of visitors who
upon my assurance that I could be contacted at any time if available in the
headquarters, used to gather near my residence and wait till late, often even
camping there for the night under the special waiting sheds, if I happened to
stay out. I made it a point to meet all visitors at the first possible opportunity,
be it any hour of the day and thus the SP Residence was almost being used like
a police station with a constant flurry of new visitors. Visitors used to come
to meet from long distances and if they did not find me available, they
preferred to spend the night waiting in Bagaha rather than going back to their
villages since travelling was not easy both due to bad roads as well as due to
fear of the dasyus. In the initial days, I was staying alone as my wife could join
me only towards the end of December, 2006 and soon left thereafter.
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| The Camp behind SP, Residence, Bagaha |
Of the constant flurry of visitors reaching
round the clock at the residence, while many met in the confidential office
chamber, there were some others who did not want to meet in the open for the
fear of being identified. There was an atmosphere of suspicion all around as
many even in the police department were not above doubt and could have been
supplying information to the gangs about people meeting the SP as well as about
the surprise movements of the forces. Such confidential visitors were met
behind the residence on the river banks either in the early morning or late at
nights. They generally would either call on the mobile phone or send message
through someone and a secret meeting would soon be organized.
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| With Satishji near Valmikinagar |
It was in these days that I
befriended Satishji, a veteran forest lover and still a bachelor hailing from
Bagaha, who had spent much of his life exploring the forests of Valmikinagar.
He became a regular visitor at the camp office in the evenings and narrated
stories of earlier police officers and their adventures in the district. He had
earlier probably also been a good hunter, but with the change of forest laws had now become a
narrator of the adventure stories which could no longer be practiced or witnessed
in the present. He was well known to most officers who had served in Bagaha and
shared a good camaraderie with all and this I could feel immediately after
joining the district on the very first day when he had arranged dinner for the
camping Divisional Commissioner and the senior Police officers. In this first
dinner I had in Bagaha, he had arranged for special local prawns and fishes which
had been well fried with spices and make a good snack that went well during the
talks in the evening. He soon became a regular visitor at the SP residence and also
accompanied me during some trips to the remote forests and diaras in search of
criminals, when his presence served as an additional source guiding me about
the characteristics of places being visited and of species being encountered in
the wild.
An Ambush near Ratwal – Getting closer
to the dasyus !
As I met many people all these days,
I could make several informers many of whom appeared quite promising as they
shared details about the whereabouts of criminals in the diara and the jungles.
I was slowly getting more and more acquainted with the pattern of crime in the
district when I was approached by a gentleman from Ratwal who earlier had been
introduced to me by my senior as a trustworthy contact person. Quite popular in
his village Ratwal, he had cultivable ancestral lands which fell in the diaras
of the Gandak. Being located closely to the hideouts of the diara gangs, his
family was always under threat and surveillance, and had learnt to live the
hard way. They had their own spies all along the diara and used to guard their
place of residence in Ratwal round the clock with armed sentries who made use
of the licensed weapons issued by the district administration. This gentleman who
soon became a friend had a very mysterious way of talking and always appeared
very confident with an innocent smile. During our second meeting, which took
place at my camp office around mid-December, he informed me about the presence
of criminals in the diara near Ratwal and that they could be trapped if they
took shelter some day within the village. He explained that the dasyus at times
took shelter in the village at certain times in the night only to return back
to the diara by the early morning which with its tall grasses and other camouflage
was considered naturally safe by them.
Just around 2 days after the second
meeting, I received a call from him in the evening that one particular gang had
been spotted as having entered a nearby settlement in the afternoon and had not
left and could be planning to camp there for the night. He suggested that if
ambushes were laid on the riverside, they could be trapped on the way back towards
the river in the early morning as was their regular modus. As I had earlier
discussed the methods of organizing such a surprise raid, I saw it very
promising and immediately organized for a joint police team consisting of platoons
from the CRPF and STF along with the local police to form into 4 different
groups which were seated separately on 4 different tractors to enter Ratwal.
Tractors were specially chosen as the medium of transport since their sound was
unlikely to raise alarm being often used for transport of sugarcane by the
villagers in the night hours. It was quite a dark night as we left Bagaha for
Ratwal. At Ratwal we met our trusted source, who had along with him 3 more
persons to guide the assembled police teams in different directions for laying
ambushes on the riverside. After quietly disembarking from the vehicles, the
teams started moving on foot for about a kilometer to the ambush points. It was
a dark and cold night of December and most villagers were thus indoors while
some dogs could be heard barking as the forces moved through the vegetation
near the village and into the wild diara.
By about 1 am, the four teams were in
place as was being coordinated upon wireless sets. It was planned to carefully
keep a watch over the suspicious movements towards the river while the police
teams hid themselves behind the tall grasses and bushes growing on the river
side. At my point where I was camping with a team of the district police
personnel, the river could not be seen due to the dense grasses which had empty
sandy spaces between them, but could well be felt as being located nearby from
the sounds of aquatic birds who often seemed to be wading through into the
waters for some unknown reason even in the night along with the peculiar sounds
they made. As we settled down and the
night hours crossed, I really wondered about the probable risk of someone
contracting a snake bite from within the dense grasses where so many humans had
ventured to stay for long into a territory known to be inhabited usually by
snakes.
While I was wondering, none of the
reptiles turned up probably due to the cold night and as some time passed I
heard some murmurs from nearby. I was informed by one of the constables about
the crossing of a herd of wild boars at a short distance from us and thus asked
everyone to be alert as these boars could be really life threatening and
powerful on the level ground where they often attacked their enemies head on
with immense momentum while their tusks tore deep into the flesh. As another
hour passed with everyone being careful and wary of the wild boars, they seemed
to have moved far and nothing but hares and birds could be vaguely seen or felt
in the vicinity as the moon light allowed more clear view. The December night
was a cold one and we had adopted the trick used by the dasyu gangs of covering
overhead with polythene sheets, to save ourselves from the effects of the dew
that was increasing every hour with the advancing night. As the morning came
closer, the birds which were being heard through the night became clearly visible
and gradually moved into the river waters. The intended enemy was still not at
sight while some farmers could now be noticed moving in their fields to light
fires around which they sat to warm up themselves for the activities of the
day.
It was thus decided to call off the
long wait, which now seemed to have been futile as the dasyu gang would probably
not leave the village so late and since the surprise behind the grassy growths
could not be maintained for long as more and more people woke up for their
daily activities in the diara. Even though, the long wait in the cold winter
night did not result into an actual encounter with the gang, the sheer movement
of forces in the early winter morning from the tall grasses of the diara had
its own impact. I could notice the surprise and awe in the eyes of the
villagers as they noticed the moving forces since they had seldom expected the
police to be laying ambush on such a cold night for the dasyus. The news of the
long ambush must have spread like wildfire in the district creating further
panic among the dasyu gangs of the diara and the jungles.
As the forces returned towards the
district headquarters, I stopped over for tea at Ratwal where the gentleman had
an old house which had among its old collections a precious tiger bust. As we
sat around burning logs to shed the cold of the night in the old seating room,
his old uncle proudly proclaimed that his father had once shot the poor
creature in the forests of Valmikinagar and had got the skin tanned at Kolkata
in the early 1950’s, when hunting of tigers was still legally allowed. He
narrated the stories about how the gangs of the diara and the jungles had
shifted their modus operandi sometime in the early 1980’s from dacoities to kidnappings.
Kidnappings were practiced by the gangs as a low risk and high profit exercise,
utilizing the cover provided by the peculiar terrain of the district. He also narrated how his family had been
opposing the gangs of the area all along, while several other leading families
had actually either befriended one of the gangs or had struck compromise with
another in order to survive. They however had been opposing the gangs as a
matter of principle and thus had been on the target since long. Further, due to
their opposing the gangs in such territory, they had always assisted the
campaigns of the police and thus had been known to a generation of police
officers who got a chance to serve in the district. On the way back, I
discussed about the idea in my mind of setting up a police camp in adjoining
Nainaha, and the Ratwal family assured to assist in every way in secure setting
up of the same.
A Memorable Stay in Ganauli
After several raids and ambushes in
the diara, it was now time to deeply explore the forested parts of the police
district. The visit to Valmikinagar PS for the second time was quite
adventurous. I remember that it was a cold day when I decided to reach
Valmikinagar via Ganauli forest road since earlier I had visited it through the
main road which was highly damaged and I was exploring another options. I
stopped at the Forest Rest House to click a few photographs and also inquired
about Kamaljit from the Indian Forest Service, who was then undergoing
practical training as a probationer. Kamaljit seemed to have been on tour and
since mobile phones did not work in the areas near Valmikinagar, I dropped in a
message for him on the forest wireless. As I reached Valmikinagar using the
forest road for about 10 to 12 kms from Ganauli, I could see the evening
setting in and it was getting dark when I reached the Police station. I still
remember that it was cold when I dropped out of the vehicle to reach the Police
station verandah where two well sized logs had been put together and a small
fire was seen oozing out from the contact cavity. As I reached near the logs I
could realize that the logs had been probably burning for several days and
emitted enough heat which comforted one seated nearby.
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| Ganauli Forest Rest House |
As I sat and talked to the police
station staff about the jurisdiction, it being my second visit, I saw someone
from the forest department arrive with a message and learnt that Kamaljit was
waiting for me at the Kotraha rest house.
After some time I left for Kotraha which was about 5 kms from the PS and
met Kamaljit, who by then had already arranged for some snacks and tea and he
welcomed me to sit near the old fireplace which had been sufficiently lighted
up on the cold day. As we chatted for about two hours, dinner was served, but
our conversations about the forest and wildlife did not seem to end. Thus after
dinner, he proposed me to accompany him to the Ganauli range office where he
was then putting up and I happily agreed as there wasn’t much to do in Bagaha
on the return after a bone shaky drive of more than 3 hours. As we reached the Ganauli
range office, another log fire was waiting for us below a guava tree, which was
so welcoming that we sat beside it chatting for maybe more than three hours
after which I decided to sleep for the night in the guest house itself. This
night was one of my most memorable nights in Bagaha as I still remember the dew
drops falling from the guava tree leaves as we talked on a variety of topics
including accounts of the forests in British times and stories of Jim Corbett
and others. As I planning to retire for the night, Kamaljit informed me about
the presence of a British era wooden watch tower which had probably since never
been repaired and was located in the near vicinity of the Manor river, at about
7 kms distance from Ganauli. We planned a visit to it for the next morning.
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| The British Era Watch Tower |
The next morning as I got up lazily
around 8 a.m., it was still foggy and the Sun had still not taken full charge
of the cold day. After breakfast at the range office we left for the watch
tower. As we got down from the vehicles near Manor river, I could see Kamaljit
getting very excited. He had spotted tiger pug marks just where we got down and
showed them to me. He also briefed me about the specialities of different pug
marks and how one could even distinguish a female from a male tiger. As we
started climbing the hill for reaching the watch tower, it could be seen that
the track of the past had been damaged by the growth of wild vegetation. After
some height, vestiges of the tower could be seen. We could hear sounds of
several animals on the way and also noticed the marks left by wild boars and
other species on the ground. The fresh claw marks of a tiger could be seen on a
tree as we reached the watch tower which had been left unrepaired for long.
Promising as the view from the tower would have been, I decided to use some of
my climbing skills to reach the top with some effort. I climbed every step very
cautiously since the dilapidated wood which was quite mossy and slippery as
well could not be fully trusted. But at last I reached the top and had a lovely
view of the hilly ranges and the meandering river cutting sandy stretches
between the dense forests. The fog around impeded a clear view of the distant
ranges but nevertheless added to the overall charm of the view as I could see butterflies
wading upon the bushy undergrowth nearby. I bid farewell to Kamaljit as I had
to soon leave for Patna where I needed to officially hand over some documents
along with the charge of my previous tenure.
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| Viewing the Forests from Ganauli Watchtower |
Time for farewell from Patna
On the 22nd December, I
left for Patna where I handed over charge of City SP, Patna to the DSP, Town,
on the next day (23rd December). At the time of leaving Patna, I
could not even hand over routine charge since I had to compulsorily move totally
suddenly in the wee hours of the cold night of the 1st/2nd December
as mentioned earlier, and now was the time to get a proper farewell from the
place which had served as a home for about a year. After having several rounds
of formal and informal farewell parties in Patna, finally, on 26th
December, I left the Historic City SP Patna Residence, famous for once having
been home of Sir Charles D’Oyly, for Muzaffarpur along with my wife who was
then in the family way and in the very first month of the trimester, after
having breakfast in order to board the Saptakranti Express which started at 12
noon. After a comfortable train journey, we reached Bagaha at about 3.30 p.m,
where reaching home after a kilometre’s drive from the Railway Station, I
introduced my wife to the new residence and also informed her about the
impending visit of the IG and DIG on the next day as they were slated for a
visit to the forests of Valmikinagar.
The real beginning of the Forest
Adventures
After several trips to the diaras and
a wonderful and memorable round of the jungle with Kamaljit, my actual detailed
visits to the dense jungles started after 27th of December, 2006,
when the IG, highly interested in forest adventures and spotting wildlife, visited
from Muzaffarpur, accompanied by the DIG from Bettiah. I received the duo who
had arrived along with their families at Bagaha Railway station, and escorted
them to my residence for tea and snacks. Since my wife had just arrived the
previous day from Patna and was not in the best of health, she could not accompany
us to the jungles in the afternoon as we left. She, however, wanted me to
return from Valmikinagar by the night, and to join the senior officers on the
next morning for the jungle safari, hardly realizing what the journey from Bagaha
to Valmikinagar on the bone-shaking roads ever meant. Having reached from
Muzaffarpur by train, she still had to encounter the degree of bad roads that
this part of Bihar had to offer in those days.
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| Crossing Streams deep in the Forest was a routine |
The IG had been to Valmikinagar
several times earlier as well and seemed quite familiar with the jungle terrain.
The journey to Valmikinagar was a very interesting and motivating one as they
talked about having spotted tigers during the earlier visit and also shared
stories about jungle adventures of IPS officers in the past. On this particular
day, I got introduced to a new device called ‘spot light’ which was told to be
of great use in spotting movements of criminals alongside the roads and also
for wildlife which was the motive behind its design. It consisted of a light
bulb fixed to a holder with connecting wires which could be connected to the
battery of the vehicle and could be held by someone to shed light on the dark
surroundings as the vehicle moved. This light could spot just anything
including wildlife or even humans at a distance on the roadside, since the eyes
of most forest animals normally radiate a greenish yellowish tinge on being
spotted with light amidst the dark background, while carnivores are generally
distinguished by a yellowish reddish tinge. I got introduced to the typical
signages used to communicate between the driver and the spotlight holder
standing behind on an open roof vehicle.
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| Panchnad Nala |
On the way to Valmikinagar, we all had
adjusted ourselves in an open gypsy where Satishji accompanying us decided to
act as the spotter while the senior IG decided to drive in order to introduce
me to the art of moving safely in the forest areas in the night. With other vehicles
moving behind us, the low noise emitting gypsy created minimal disturbance in
the surrounds where one was supposed to remain silent to not disturb animals likely
to be spotted since they ran away struck with panic the moment they heard any
human voice. Returning back to the signage lessons, I should mention that the
light was to be shown on the bonnet of vehicle to indicate to the driver that
he needed to stop as something had been spotted in the vicinity. Thereafter the
directions of the light advancing were supposed to indicate the direction in
which the vehicle should proceed. It was interesting to learn these tricks as
animals in the wild were indeed spotted on the road sides as the gypsy moved
along to Valmikinagar in the evening. Without such a facility, one could only
see animals which were on the road or crossed the road and became visible in
the head light of the vehicle. Best of all, the spot light seemed really useful
for the police in the dasyu infested police district as the dasyus could not afford
to hide in the bushes during police movement with these special lights in the
night. Another caution I learnt that night was that one should never take the
name of a rabbit or hare if spotted as it reduced the probability of spotting
more animals for some unknown funny reason as believed by hunters in the past.
It was usually addressed as ‘Manhuswa (One that brought bad fortune)’ or
‘Lambhkarna (One with large ears)’.
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| A Shaky Camera inside the Forest near Ganauli |
The evening passed off well as we
reached Valmikinagar guest house where we had a relaxed dinner amid interesting
chats about forest life and adventures. After the dinner, I requested to bid
departure to Bagaha to see my wife who was waiting having asked me to return
back in the night. Seldom did she realise what returning in the slightly foggy
night on the haphazard roads passing through the jungles could have meant, but I wanted to keep my promise
as she had just arrived in a totally new house on just the previous day. As we
returned in the night, we rushed back without the facility of the spotlight
that we had on the onward journey. It was a lonely and quiet return till
Madanpur, about 10 kms before Bagaha, and I was feeling sleepy when I was
suddenly attracted by the whisper of one of my bodyguards named Nasrullah. A
leopard was being seen just in front of the vehicle quietly walking by the
roadside as we were passing through a settlement near Madanpur forest rest
house. The Leopard may have been looking for some easy prey near the human
settlement and was walking unchallenged on the road late at night as it was
already around 1.30 a.m., and the villagers well slept inside their houses in
the cold and foggy winter night. I reached home at around 2 am and got up early
in the morning to reach Valmikinagar to join the seniors for breakfast at about
9 a.m.
The day was a cold one with shades of
sunlight appearing as we entered the forest near Jatashankar temple at about
10.30 a.m. to reach Panchnad Nala only after crossing not less than 40 streams
using vehicles in the same manner as described above. Though looking around in
the hope of spotting tigers in the wild, none could be spotted that day despite
roaming around for kilometres inside the jungles and the highlights of the day
included two groups of spotted deer and wild boar apart from some birds. After
dinner at the Valmikinagar rest house we again roamed around in the night
around the barrage and airstrip where a lot of hares could be seen along with birds
in the open grounds with tall grasses. Several herds of deer and nilgais were
seen close to the road as we moved upto Kotraha from where I left for Bagaha as
the senior officers retreated for the night. I was not so lucky on this night
as the previous one, but nevertheless did see some more deer in the woods near
Valmikinagar road railway station as I reached Bagaha and entered into the
quilt to spend the hours before the morning. The next morning breakfast was
planned at the Sugar Mill guest house at Bagaha as the officers had to depart
early by train for their headquarters. As I left them at the Railway Station, I
was feeling very happy to have been posted in Bagaha, where I could freely
explore the jungles and natural beauty of the diaras in pursuit of the dreaded
criminals which was my main task. It was a place which doubled Work with
Adventure and at the young age that I had been posted I was sure to make the
most of it.
Settling down in Bagaha
As my wife settled down, it was time
for the new year eve, when Satishji visited me and we quietly celebrated the
arrival of the new year at the residence. The next morning I decided to visit
the outpost recently set up at ‘Bauk Baitha ka Gotha’. I crossed the river
carrying my gypsy and another jeep on boats as we stood gazing at the flow of
the river waters. As I thought about the risks involved in such travelling for
someone who did not know swimming or did not have life jackets in case the boat
capsized due to overload, I was informed that such boats safely carried bullock
carts laden with sugarcane from the diara to the mainland and also tractors and
their trollies separately which were used to transport goods to and from the
diara. I also learnt that some of the boats operating in the remote diaras were
operated by the henchmen of the dasyus who levied a fee over usage of such mode
of transport. As the boats reached the other side, the vehicles were downloaded
and we started on to reach the Ghotha, where the cup of tea made in pure
unadulterated milk of the desi cow reared in the neighbourhood along with the
peda (sweetmeat) that was offered by the camping constables still remains in
memory.
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| Relaxed moment at SP, Residence |
I had thoroughly started enjoying my
work in Bagaha. As I moved around remote places in the district at sudden surprise
timings and even camped with the forces at night, it was creating a definite
fear in the gangs who were not used to such policing. My wife left for Patna
again after a fortnight since she had to undergo routine medical check-ups in
the first trimester of pregnancy, and since such facilities were then not
available in Bagaha in the absence of even a trained gynaecologist. By mid-January,
2007, I was again staying alone in the Bagaha residence and had full time for
adventure and roaming around in the wild. Every day was like a living adventure
with a great sense of service as the sugarcane seizure campaign continued till
early March.
A Forced Three Night Camp in the ‘Don’
I was always looking for different
ways to move around the district and had by the beginning of February created a
basic kit with sleeping bags and other basic requirements like emergency lights
etc. which could enable camping even in the open. I was more prepared for
outdoor camps and tried camping at different locations in the district
regularly to make the police impact felt. At times I would use the train to go
to Ramnagar from Bagaha and would return by vehicles. The movements always had
a surprise element and I would seldom use the same route on the return journey.
A new Landmine-proof vehicle had arrived in the district in February and I
wanted to test its effectiveness in the jungles and undulating hills of Bagaha,
where the Maoist threat loomed large. After surrender of a group of Maoists
towards the end of January, which is part of the next chapter of stories from
Bagaha, I wanted to visit more families of the Maoist cadres in order to
convince them to persuade their relatives to surrender and join the mainstream
taking advantage of the rehabilitation package offered by the Government. On
one of the days, I planned to supervise a case in Goverdhana PS near Ramnagar
and further to try using the Landmine-proof vehicle to reach and inspect
Gobrahiya PS using the forest road from Ramnagar. I started for Ramnagar in the
evening and planned the visit to Gobrahiya for the next morning after a visit to
Goverdhana and to return back to Bagaha by the night. After supervising the
case near Goverdhana, I started on a long journey which took about 4 hours from
Ramnagar to reach Gobrahiya PS. The DSP of Ramnagar along with the
Officer-in-charges of Ramnagar, Cheutaha, Semra and Goverdhana Police Stations
also accompanied me for the trip to Gobrahiya since I was travelling by a new
medium which was a cause of quite excitement.
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| The Landmine Proof Vehicle |
Such a vehicle had earlier never been
seen by the villagers residing in the ‘Don’ area, so named due to its being a
valley between two hill ranges of which one was on the Indian side whereas the
other lay in Nepal. It was about 4 p.m. when I reached Gobrahiya Forest House,
where after a cup of tea and refreshments I decided to go and inspect the
Police Station. At this point of time I noticed several villagers assembled
near the main portico of the Guest House who wanted to meet me. They complained
about the behavior and deemed atrocities of the local Officer-in-charge who
would reportedly often threaten the villagers and extort money under the threat
of possible arrest. A few cases were narrated before me as I left for Gobrahiya
PS and started with the inspection. As the inspection continued, I noticed that
the O/c had been very negligent and irresponsible in his conduct and was not seemingly
befitting the post he was holding. I ordered his suspension immediately and
noticed no remorse or guilt in his eyes even as the other officers accompanying
me watched on. Just about this time, when the atmosphere had become tense due
to the punishment meted out for his irresponsible conduct with me being angry
and internally pained, a severe storm started flipping the doors and window
panes of the old police station building as papers flew into the air. People started
rushing helter skelter to close the window panes and unhappy with the sudden
results of the inspection, I left the Police Station immediately to reach the
Forest Rest House from where I intended to start upon the return journey via
Harnatar or Valmikinagar to Bagaha as the vehicle had been tested and found to
be quite effective even in the undulating terrain during our trial in the day.
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| Struggle after the Rains |
But destiny had surely planned it
otherwise since it started raining heavily immediately and continued almost
non-stop after the storm. Around 8 p.m., as we waited for the rains to end, it
was decided to make arrangements for dinner of the about 30 persons
accompanying me. But, with a suspended Officer-in-charge who would have usually
been assigned such responsibilities, and a bad weather, the whole team was
almost left to fend for itself in the small village which also contained the
threat of being attacked by the Maoists from the neighbourhood. Complicating
things further, Mobile phones did not function in the Don area in those days
due to absence of mobile towers and the wireless set of the Police Station was thus
the only way to communicate with the district headquarters at intervals of
every two hours. As we tried to send a communication about our whereabouts to
the district headquarters, it was found that the only wireless antenna which
was fixed above the Police Station building had been blown off by the storm and
could be repaired only after technical staff would arrive from the district
headquarters and which was not possible before the weather got clear. The
wireless fixed in our different vehicles could communicate with each other but
not with the district headquarters due to their short range and the intervening
hills.
As the search for provisions began in
the village amidst the continuous rain, two teams of 2 officer-in-charges each
went in two directions communicating with each other on wireless. One of the
teams managed to procure some rice, pulses and spices from the only shop in the
village after locating its owner who had gone home to sleep and was fully
inebriated when he was requested to open the shop for purchases. The other
managed to procure about 6 desi chickens as deemed sufficient for the whole
group. As the teams returned back to the rest house, a 3-sentried guard had
been mounted to respond to any Maoist attack, and a large fire had been lit up
in the main courtyard in front of the two rooms it had. In the absence of the
main cook of the guest house who had left for his village seldom expecting
visitors to stay there in the night, the police personnel got a chance to
utilize their cooking talent which finally resulted in producing dinner at 2 am
in the night. With the rains still continuing and threat of Maoist attack not
overruled, all stayed awake till first light and sat chatting around the
fireplace.
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| Deep inside the Forest |
I slept for some time before I was
woken up due to the sounds of men moving around as the rains stopped. Efforts
were made to procure more provisions for the preparation of a breakfast-cum-lunch
as one team was sent to check the level of waters in the river Masan so as to
estimate when it would become fordable by vehicles after receding of flash
floods due to continuous rain. By the time lunch was ready it was already 2
p.m, and the team from the river returned with the news that it was simply not
possible to cross the river as the water level was still quite high to even
drown tractors in places. We were thus forced to wait for another night as the
drizzling started and continued till the whole evening. Rains had stopped by
the night when we followed the same routine of the previous day and spent time
chatting about the adventures different officers had been through in their
policing careers. It was delightful to learn the experiences of officers who
seldom had the time to recollect their past as turbulent police life went on.
Here forced to camp at Gobrahiya by mother nature and its circumstances, one
had a lot of time which could be spent well only by chatting as it rained
outside.
As the rains were not as heavy as the
previous day and had fully stopped by midnight, a team was despatched to check
the river conditions in the next early morning. The team soon returned and
informed that the river waters had receded and it was now possible to plan the
return journey. Everyone looked restless as it had been 2 consecutive nights in
the same place without much provisions and none could even change clothes
having come fully unprepared for the stay. After an early brunch of ‘khichdi
(boiled rice, pulses and vegetables with salt) we set out on the journey
towards Harnatar hoping to cross over the Masan and the hills and thus reach
the district headquarters at Bagaha. The unmetalled roads had become soft after
the rains but nevertheless allowed the movement of police vehicles, all of
which had been equipped with four wheel drives. Just about 3 kms after we left
the forest rest house, there seemed to have been some problem when one of the
wheels of the Landmine-proof vehicle in which I was seated got stuck in a
channel made for irrigation of the fields near a culvert which capsized under
the enormous weight of the vehicle designed to be a monster to take on the
impact of landmines.
The driver tried all his skills to
get the wheel out of the channel, but all efforts seemed to be in vain as the
wheel sunk further. Some villagers working in the nearby fields gathered by
then and started watching the police making efforts for getting the heavy
vehicle out. As more time passed, several ideas originated in different minds and
were tried, but, none seemed to work in the wet fields. Villagers by then
assembled about 3 tractors from the vicinity and joining them to each other and
the Landmine-proof vehicle by chains made an effort to pull it out. As the
power seemed less, more tractors were roped in to pull out the vehicle. After a
lot of human effort and a combined pull of 7 tractors joined together with
chains, the stuck wheel finally came out and the vehicle was now ready to move.
By this time it was clear that there was no point trying to move ahead in the
same vehicle as there was every likelihood of facing the same problem in more
places since such channels were present across most agricultural fields through
which the road passed.
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| The Forests of Champaran |
The best solution was to drive the
vehicle back in the reverse gear to the Forest Rest house and to then park it
at the Police Station to be moved again on some other day when the roads would
be firm and dry enough after the rains ended. The same was done and by the time
we returned back to the rest house, it was already 5 p.m. as drizzling had
again started. Fearing more rains and sudden flash floods, we could not move
out on even the third consecutive night which followed more or less the same
routine with everyone only more tired and restless. The next morning, we left for Valmikinagar on
vehicles leaving behind the Landmine-proof vehicle at the Police Station, from
where it could finally be brought back to Bagaha only after a month or so. As I
reached Valmikinagar, I noticed an ASI moving on a motorcycle and learnt that
he was searching for us in the jungles as the DIG at Bettiah was very worried
and concerned about our whereabouts. We had no communication with the outside
world for all these three nights and returning to Valmikinagar where we could
see proper markets seemed like a return back to civilization. After reaching
Bagaha in the day, I called up the DIG and informed him about what had
surpassed in the three preceding nights and he was awestruck having been worried
all the time as 1 SP, 1 DSP and 4 O/c’s of the district had been missing and
out of reach of communication for so long. The district had remained peaceful
all these days and very soon I funnily experienced that the district always
remained peaceful whenever I camped out.
As times passed…
With such adventures and more coming
as a routine, times passed on well in Bagaha with me busy in the campaign
against the Dasyu gangs of the diaras and the Maoists of the Forests. I moved
out more and more in inaccessible reaches of the district and talked to people
generating confidence during the interactions. I had developed a network of
good informers and public following by March. After Holi, the weather changed as
summers approached and allowed for more clear visibility in the jungles. The
surrender campaign gained momentum as criminals started surrendering possibly taking
a cue from the Maoists from March onwards. The sugarcane seizure campaign and
continued raids started making their effect on the minds of criminals as a
positive atmosphere was generated due to sustained counselling of the family
members of the outlaws. The surrender campaign and the adventures that went
along side are part of another detailed chapter and thus I would end this
chapter on the ‘Bagaha Adventures’ with the account of another very adventurous
night spent by the river under forced circumstances towards the end of June,
2007.
The Night Spent in the River
Around
February, I had discovered that the police department had a good motorboat
which due to some technical lacuna was lying unused and neglected in a corner
of the town. I tried to get it repaired in March and was finally successful
when it started working towards the end of May. But even as it became usable
towards the end of May, 2007, the low level of waters in the river made navigation
for long distances difficult. Coupled with the problem posed by the river
sands, it used to consume a lot of fuel amounting to not less than 20 litres of
Petrol per hour as it moved. One would have needed to carry extra fuel
depending upon the number of hours that one intended to float. I was waiting
for the onset of the rains and planned to move into the most inaccessible
regions of the diara in rainly times when instead of walking for miles,
travelling by the newly repaired motorboat would have been the better option, was
what I supposed. By the month of June, the monsoons had already arrived and
more waters were now available in the Gandak making it more navigable than
earlier when the motorboat blades often used to get stuck in the weeds or sands
which could not be seen from above the waters in the vast riverbed.
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| Getting ready for the River |
With the
above objective in mind, I started trial runs of the boat to move around in the
river for 2 to 3 hours occasionally as the rains set in June. Encouraged by the
results in a week, I started working on a longer patrolling plan. I started
mapping villages which lay either on the river or one of its streams to find
out the viability of reaching them by boat. On one fine Saturday afternoon, I finally
felt like implementing the plan to reach the end of the district river boundary
and its diaras by boat. Although I had visited most of the diaras on foot by
then in Bagaha, I wanted to try the new way of reaching them through the river after
alighting the motorboat which by then was tied to a newly constructed shed on
the river banks just behind my residence. I wanted to complete the trip in 3 to
4 hours so as to return back by the night being confident that the headlights
of the boat along with the spot lights would make it a comfortable ride back
home.
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| Pashupati with Mahtoji on the Boat near Bagaha |
As it was quite
an adventurous plan being thought of and had not been tried earlier by the
police, I called up Satishji to accompany me and he immediately agreed to join
in the intended river journey. I asked my driver Pashupati Singh to prepare for
the ride and got readied 4 armed and 2 unarmed men along for taking care of
unforeseen situations on the way which would be passing through the hideouts of
the dasyu gangs. After a lot of preparation, we finally started from Bagaha at
about 4.30 pm with about 40 litres of fuel in the tank which consumed 20 litres
per hour. About 20 litres extra fuel was taken in another container which was
deemed as sufficient for the return journey since Ratwal was hardly 15
kilometres by the riverside we calculated.
It was a
good start as we soon crossed the ghat behind the Bagaha Police Station at a
distance of about 6 kms. The river had swelled up after the rains, and with a
lot of water there was no problem in driving the boat. We were going downstream
and were supported by the flow of the Gandak, when upon foreseeing some trouble
in returning by the night due to the swollen waters, Satishji advised that we
should get back as the sun was about to set and as after sunset there could be
problems which he still didn’t clearly define. But I got support from my driver
Pashupati who seldom worried about any unforeseen problems and always beamed
with confidence as we moved through in Bagaha. The more the trouble in the way,
the more interesting and adventurous it became was the maxim we generally
adopted while moving carefree in the remote patches of the district. So, we
decided to go further in the river journey, no longer worrying about it getting
darker.
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| The Ship of the Narayani ! |
As we
moved further, we realized that the fuel was about to finish and going further upstream
would simply be impossible. Since we were near Ratwal at that time, we decided
to camp at Ratwal for sometime and to procure more fuel for the return journey.
I called up my friend from Ratwal on phone and informed him about our plans, as
he started towards Ratwal Ghat to receive us. Sheomuni Prasad, the District STF
in-charge was also called to assemble with force and 60 litres of fuel at
Ratwal Ghat. From the river we took the route along a small canal for about 5
kms to reach Ratwal Ghat. This canal usually had very less water in other
seasons, but had enough water to probably drown a human at this time making it perhaps
quite comfortable for our boat to tread through. We reached Ratwal House from
the canal at about 6.30 pm sitting in the police jeep from the Ghat. This
approximately was the time that a road journey then would have taken to reach
the same destination. Encouraged by the results of the boat adventure so far,
we chatted over snacks and tea as more fuel was being procured for the boat. It
had been quite nice so far, and at this point of time we still didn’t know what
had awaited us ahead for the night.
About 60
more litres of fuel was collected as we moved towards Ratwal ghat at about 8.30
p.m. after having a heavy snack to take care of hunger by the time we would
reach Bagaha. The officer-in-charge of Bagaha was also asked to keep ready fuel
not less than 40 litres for emergencies in case the fuel would get exhausted
before we reached Bagaha. As we boarded the boat back at Ratwal ghat, the
weather looked seemingly clear and we were in quite high spirits hoping for a
comfortable ride back to Bagaha. It was going to be about 5 kms back to the
river via the canal from Ratwal. From there it was going to be a smooth ride I had
felt but the optimism was to receive a jolt soon. Only after about 10 minutes
as we left Ratwal ghat and entered the canal, the motor boat got stuck at an
unsuspected location where we had sailed well just about 3 hours ago. The boat
was equipped with a long rope which now became handy as Mahtoji, a hardworking Homeguard
jawan belonging to the Tharu tribe from the hilly areas of the district jumped
out from the boat onto the grassy canal bank and pulled it out with some
effort.
But the
sailing was not going to be smooth thereafter as the boat got stuck almost
after every 2 to 3 hundred metres on the way to the river which was just 5 kms
away and which had not taken more than 20 or 25 minutes during our evening
journey. The waters in the canal had probably receded during the time we spent
collecting fuel in Ratwal, and as I learnt these water levels were ever
fluctuating depending upon the discharge from the barrage at Valmikinagar,
where the river entered into India from the Nepalese side. But even as the jolty
boat ride in the stream was introducing us to newer complications at every
small interval, the spot light and headlight of the boat which was supposed to
guide us well in the dark started attracting different species of insects from
all over the neighbouring diara. Rains had accentuated the insect population in
the region which was seldom felt while travelling in the day time when the
insects lay hidden in the grasses. But at this hour the experience was
traumatic with them swarming the boat lights in thousands being attracted by
the sudden lights in the otherwise dark surrounds.
The terrible
insect ordeal could end only after about four hours of an ever interrupting
ride which was scaled to completion with much of physical human effort being
put into amidst the insects biting all over. Around midnight, we finally
succeeded in entering the main river from the Ratwal stream. At this point as
we left the stream we seemed to have disturbed several alligators who not less
than 10 to 15 in number suddenly jumped with a typical sound into the waters
from their resting places in the grasses. One of them with a long open snout (in
which one could have tried to count the number of teeth in the spotlight)
continued swimming parallel to our boat for almost 200 metres when it suddenly disappeared
below and into the waters. As we started the boat towards Bagaha, it was
realized that much fuel had been exhausted in the effort to cross the stream
and that reaching Bagaha was not possible without adequate replenishment on the
way. About 20 litres of fuel was left with us in addition to whatever may have remained
in the fuel tank. The river there had spread itself for almost a kilometer
after the rains and from our position in the boat, its banks could not be seen
by either the headlight or spot light when we tried to figure out whether we
were proceeding in the right direction. As it became post-midnight, the boat
seemed to be proceeding directionless in the dark trying to move against the
flow which seemed to be quite fast bringing with it large weeds and portions of
trees uprooted by the floodwaters.
Soon it
was realized that there was no point in trying to reach Bagaha in that way by
the night and that we needed to park the boat somewhere on the banks and then
further wait for sunlight to render the waters navigable. Thus, turning the
boat towards the bank, we reached a place which looked quite clear and sandy with
the grasses growing upon not very high amidst open patches. As we anchored the
boat and disembarked upon the banks, we started chatting about the
circumstances since the evening which had finally forced us to camp there in
the open for the night. Our spirits had still not dimmed down and some seemed
to be fully enjoying the adventurous night when suddenly it started raining and
we realized that there was nowhere to hide in the open diara which had no trees
or shed for kilometres apart. The rains spelt further trauma as we were not
carrying any umbrellas or even polythene sheets since such untimely rain had
simply not been expected given the weather conditions of the time when we had
left Bagaha.
But destiny
had it surely planned for us in that way as it rained and rained continuously
for not less than 2 hours, when it finally stopped leaving everyone fully drenched
and swollen with water marking the insect bites more prominently. As I took off
my shirt in order to fold and remove excess water, I noticed that Satishji was
staring at his newly purchased mobile phone, a Nokia N70 model, then quite
expensive and costing about 27,000 rupees. He had placed the set in the space
below the windscreen of the boat to protect it from the rains seldom realizing
that the cavity had an inward tilt designed to prevent objects placed from
falling away. As the rains continued, rainwater got collected in the space and
submerged the new phone set from all sides to damage it possibly beyond repair.
I had protected my phone all along the two hours trying to shield it in some
way by acting as an umbrella for it and happily it was still on when I decided
to see the time which was now about 3.30 am.
As the day
became clear, we started towards Bagaha on the boat with all being tired and
exhausted after the traumatic happenings of the night. At that point our
camping location was not very clear since we had just reached the nearest bank
with much effort in the dark night, when the boat had seemed to be moving
directionless for some time in the main river. As we moved, I could see
beautiful black partridges all along on the banks, a sight which I had always
loved to watch, but, which on this occasion did not excite as I was then
wanting to just reach back home. After some travelling we came across a farmer
walking on the banks, from whom we learnt that our boat instead of moving
upstream in the night had actually gone downstream by not less than 10 kms. While
we were trying to move towards Bagaha in the dark night, we were actually led
in the opposite direction. It was a wise decision to camp on the banks
otherwise we may have travelled furthermore downstream.
As not
much fuel was left in the boat, we parked it in a diara which was approachable
from Ratwal and leaving the driver Pashupati along with Mahtoji behind to take
care of the boat we started on foot towards Ratwal. After walking for a
kilometer, a bullock cart was met with and tired as we were after the exhaustion
of the night, we decided to board it upto Ratwal ghat. At Ratwal ghat, the
Police Station Jeep had already arrived and it dropped me at my residence at
about 11 am, where after having breakfast I slept till 4 p.m. I was woken up by
repeated phone calls and due to a large number of people waiting outside the
residence to meet. As I wound up the official activities of the day, it was
past 8 p.m. and as the boat had yet not arrived, I ventured out onto the banks
and waited for its arrival just behind my residence. After some time the
headlight was visible at a distance, and the boat finally reached Bagaha by
about 11 p.m., with a tired driver and Mahtoji, who together narrated the story
of how they had managed to get the boat back with the help of local boatmen after
being replenished with fuel at three places.
Work and
Adventure continued…
Undeterred
still, the adventures at Bagaha continued on and on with every day conveying
some new possibility. I received several visitors and friends during these days
as moving with them made the jouneys and adventures even more exciting. My younger
brother stayed with me for about a fortnight in June/July after the memorable night
we spent in the river and we could spot a tiger near Ganauli during a trip
along with other wildlife. The diara of Nainaha soon became my favourite
adventure destination where I would just drive down at any hour of the day or
night. Almost all who visited me were definitely taken there for a pleasure
trip. Apart from travelling all around, I could also at times find some gap for
fishing and bird watching apart from observing daily sunsets on the Narayani. I
would be writing more on the adventures in the next chapter when I would also
be recollecting the stories behind some surrenders and kidnappings during my
initial tenure.
 |
| The Jungles near Valmikinagar |
To be
continued…..
(Next chapter planned on the different Dasyu
gangs and their surrenders)
