Story by: Rushant Dhanwatay
Spending 24 hours on a machan in a tiger reserve (Pench National Park, Madhya Pradesh, India) wasn’t the highlight of the census for me in the year 2017. Machan census is a data collection activity where a team of two or more individuals sit at a height of 15-20 feet on a man-made platform called a machan and record the animal species they see.
Seeing Sambar Deer, Wild Boar, Indian Gaur and a sloth bear with two babies was more than any wildlife enthusiast could dream of, and the best part of the census took place at around 6 pm. After hearing the clouds rumble for almost an hour, it began to rain. The raindrops were small and scarce but soon turned large and down came the hail.
The machan which was built on two teak trees and two old rotting bamboo poles began to sway violently. Within a few minutes, I along with the forest labourer, Vijay, were completely drenched. This was when we realised that this wasn’t the occasional summer shower but a thunderstorm that wasn’t getting over any time soon.
The momentary relief from the heat that the rain brought with it vanished. The little thatched roof was no match for the furious winds. The straw from the roof was made just to protect us from the scorching summer sun and was clearly not a match for the storm.
Vijay placed his axe on the roof of the machan, which would act as a lightning conductor and save us if lighting struck. The rain didn’t stop or even reduce after 10 minutes. Since it wasn’t safe to sit on the machan any longer, Vijay suggested to go to the forest patrolling outpost which was 5 kms away.
I love wildlife and I’ve seen tigers and other animals a lot of times, but that day was different. It was a perfect combination of fear and excitement. The red soil on the forest roads had turned to slush.
I tried hard to keep up with Vijay as we jogged along the road. Halfway through our way, I began to feel tired and stopped to catch my breath. It was raining so heavily that the visibility was limited to merely 10 feet.
After waiting for a minute, we started to run again. In about 30 minutes, we saw the forest patrolling post. Two senior forest rangers posted there were waiting for the rain to slow down so they could go into the forest and assess the condition of other machans. They made tea for us on a wooden stove around which we all sat to get some warmth.
The radio towers were down and there was no way for us to contact the base. The rain eventually subsided as we finished our tea. In a few more minutes, there was some broken noise we could hear over the old wireless radio. One of the rangers adjusted the frequency knobs a little and responded that our team was okay.
We were given the choice of getting extracted to the base or spend the rest of the night on our machan. However, to stay on the machan, the rangers had to do a quick inspection of it to see if it was safe to stay there.
In one instance, Vijay and I looked at each other with very similar smiles on our faces. Our smiles spoke so much more than words could have and all he said was “chalo”, meaning let’s go, and we were back on our machan doing what we loved.
Rushant is someone who has received his love for wildlife as a hereditary trait. He comes from a family of hunters who turned wildlife conservationists. His love for wildlife led him to pursue a degree in zoology, which was when he discovered the use of tourism as a tool for conservation and started a safari lodge in Pench Tiger Reserve. He is currently pursuing his M.Sc in Tourism management in the U.K. to learn how to make wildlife tourism more sustainable. He can be reached out on his Instagram handle (business) and on LinkedIn.
All pictures in this story are owned by Rushant, unless stated otherwise.
