Walking along the narrow trail splitting from the main jungle road, we found ourselves by a marshy pool with some trees and shrubs dotting its banks. The vegetation on its immediate fringes was relatively sparse but beyond lay a vast swathe of dark and foreboding greenery. Our guide, the forest guard gestured us to avoid making any unnecessary noise, as he seemed to sense the presence of an animal behind the dense woods. With bated breath and mounting anticipation we tiptoed our way in silence, narrowing the distance between us and the object of our questing eyes. It was a mere quiver in the bushes that did not escape the trained eyes of the guard and gave the animal’s presence away even though it was still out of our sights. Being in the bushes, however, the animal held the advantage and easily noticed the approaching intruders before they could see it. Off it went in a flash and all we saw was a rapidly moving wave cutting through the forest before everything was still and quiet once again. All this happened so fast that even a passing glimpse of the animal eluded us. The guard told us that it could have been a leopard or a lesser predator like wild cat, of which the forest had a good population.

Our dipped spirits at missing out on an exciting creature lifted when the guard pointed towards a treetop. Resting on a branch was a large peacock, looking composed and elegant. The bird apparently did not take kindly to our incursion which disturbed its early morning siesta. In no mood to oblige us, it let out a shill cry, spread its enormous wings and descended on a graceful flight into the deeper recesses of the foliage.

Our walk over, we got into the forest jeep together with AK Bodo, the Range Officer, Sushil Das, the Forester, and the guard. A veil of mist floating under the emerald canopy above glowed with the faint sunshine, spinning an ethereal weave. The mundane turned into the sublime as sunlight and shadows got intertwined in a delicate interplay. Surrounding us on all sides was an impregnable green fortress beckoning us to explore its mystifying folds. We felt humbled and dwarfed at the vastness of the wilds and the serene tranquillity it emanated. We moved slowly, scanning the greenery and stopping occasionally to throw an assiduous look when something seemed to disturb the still undergrowth.

Barnadi, located on the Bhutan foothills in Assam’s Udalguri district, is a little paradise of nature, barely covering 27 sq km. In spite of its manifold charms, it struggles to figure in the popular tourists’ itinerary. But as we discovered, it is the absence of the buzzing tourists that has lent Barnadi a haunting ambience and my firm conviction is that a walk along the unspoilt jungle trails of Barnadi — even though you will need a lot of luck to trace animals — is no less exhilarating an experience than an elephant safari in Kaziranga where animals appear in their hordes. Unlike in forests associated with large-scale viewing of wildlife, the element of suspense will be your infallible companion in Barnadi, and the anticipation (or apprehension?) of confronting a lurking animal that can make a surprise appearance as you take a turn in a meandering trail makes your experience far more exciting. Considering its small size, Barnadi shelters a wide array of wildlife, the most famous being the critically-endangered and extremely elusive pigmy hog and hispid hare — found nowhere else in the world with Manas National Park being the sole exception.

It was a cold January day when we — my brother Devasish, cousin Rajiv and yours truly — embarked on a drive to Barnadi after deciding on it as a wildlife destination with a difference. Our journey from Guwahati covering a short distance of some 90 km was eventful. We started out only in the evening taking into account the short distance, but it turned out to be a miscalculation. The road was hardly motorable in patches and rendered our movement very slow. By nightfall the area wore a deserted look with the few shops downing their shutters and the residents confining themselves to the indoors. Our apprehensions grew a little when a solemn-looking man who seemed to appear out of nowhere in the dark told us to be careful about wandering in the night as the place had an unfriendly reputation, thanks to insurgency. With no one to ask for directions, we took wrong turns on a couple of occasions and our cup of misery was full when we had a car breakdown in the dead of night. With my expertise on cars restricted to driving, I left the matter to my competent companions, both well-versed in the ways of vehicles, and started capturing in my camera the moods of the moon silhouetted against a large tree and making a silvery, quivering reflection on a roadside pool — much to the chagrin of the toiling duo who were sweating it out with the unresponsive engine. About half an hour later their perseverance was rewarded — the car roared back lo life and at long last we reached our destination but not without a few more hiccups, which I am not going to elaborate on lest I should bore you and deviate from the main subject.

Keen on savouring as natural an experience as possible, we ventured into the dew-dipped woods at the crack of dawn and took to exploring a jungle trail. The moving cloak of haze caressed our cheeks as a gentle breeze filled our nostrils with a nameless fragrance — the unmistakable aroma of the jungle. Laid out below our feet was a multi-hued velvety carpet formed by fallen leaves, as if welcoming us into the Eden. Even as we soaked in the splendour of nature, we could not yet locate a single animal. Lady luck was not with us that day, and despite getting a number of signs betraying the presence of animals, we did not come across any. One explanation of the highly reticent behaviour of the jungle denizens could be that Barnadi is least frequented by visitors and this must have made the animals extremely wary of human presence. The only consolation was that we came across several species of birds.

The habitat of Barnadi comprises grassland and moist mixed deciduous forests besides a patch of moist mixed evergreen forests. Apart from its two flagship species, Barnadi shelters elephant, tiger, leopard, black leopard, Himalayan black bear, gaur, wild boar, small Indian civet, pangolin, capped langur, slow loris, sambar, barking deer, hog deer, wild dog, jungle cat, porcupine, etc, and also boasts of a sizeable avian population, including migratory species. The exact status of the pigmy hog and hispid hare in Barnadi is unclear, as there has been no census of these two elusive mammals. “While sightings have been extremely rare, we do get signs of their presence occasionally,” Bodo said.

Proceeding eastward we arrived at the sanctuary’s boundary marked by the Nalapara river. Being a seasonal river fed by rainwater from the Bhutan hills, it was dry at that time. But it is only a matter of a few months before it metamorphoses into a big, frothing torrent with the advent of the monsoons, and completes a stunning landscape with the Bhutan hills at the backdrop. The dry riverbed — bearing imprints of footmarks of different animals — would be another object of curiosity for any wildlife enthusiast. We discovered the footmarks of as many as seven different animals on the sandy riverbed. On the west, the sanctuary which forms a part of the buffer zone of Manas Tiger Reserve is bordered by the Barnadi river.

Notwithstanding its significance, Barnadi, which shot to global prominence following the rediscovery of the pigmy hog and hispid hare in 1971 after they were thought to be extinct, continues to suffer for want of attention from the state government. Manned by a skeletal staff devoid of sufficient equipment and amenities in harsh jungle conditions, the security of the sanctuary is left vulnerable to human depredation. The camps do not have the requisite quorum of guards, and the movement of the staff is further hindered by the absence of adequate number of vehicles. It has just one vehicle, that too procured only recently after lots of persuasion with the higher authorities.

Encroachment is another major problem at Barnadi, with 4 sq km of its area remaining under illegal occupation. Considering that the sanctuary’s area is only 26.21 sq km, the encroachment extends to almost one-sixth of its habitat.

Poaching, too, has been among the constraints hampering conservation efforts at Barnadi. According to Bodo, while commercial poaching might not have yet attained serious dimensions, traditional hunting by some of the communities living near the forests was a worry. Some local inhabitants, however, differed with the departmental version, saying that poaching — for whatever purpose — is not uncommon in the forest. “While poaching of big animals occasionally attracts attention, killing and capturing of lesser animals and birds are rarely noticed and acted upon,” a local said.

Located close to the international border with Bhutan, Barnadi is among the oldest protected areas of the state. Declared a reserve forest in 1942, it was upgraded to a sanctuary in 1980 as part of efforts to further the conservation prospects of the pigmy hog and the hispid hare. Conservation circles feel that elevating Barnadi to a national park is an urgent need under the prevailing circumstances. It merits that status simply on the ground that it is among the very few refuges of the pigmy hog and hispid hare.

Sivasish Thakur