It takes a Village

How a biologist mobilized an all-women volunteer corps to champion an endangered bird

- Naorem Anuja

Wildlife biologist Purnima Devi Barman (42) remembers the first time she ever saw the nest of a greater adjutant stork. The birds had made their home in the broad branches of a tall, old kadam (burflower) tree that stood near her grandmother's home. As a five-year-old, the tree was one of her favourite places to play, and she would spend hours sitting under its shade, gathering its fallen blossoms and birdwatching, "My grandmother would tell me stories of Lord Krishna and Radha courting under a kadam tree. I loved that tree and the peace I felt sitting under it. I remember being terribly distressed when it was felled."

For Barman, nature, both its vagaries and its abundance, were an integral part of her world. Her father served in the army, so Barman was sent to live with her grandmother in Pub Mazirgaon, a village on the banks of the Brahmaputra. Young Barman was inconsolable at being separated from her parents, so, to keep her occupied, her grandmother would take her to their paddy fields and tell her stories about birds and animals. The love for the natural world she developed in those years left a lasting imprint, one that led Barman to devote her life to wildlife conservation-specifically saving the endangered greater adjutant stork.