The Raj and the natural world: The war against ‘dangerous beasts’ in colonial India

Studies in History

Volumn 14, Issue 2, 1998, Pages 265-299

  Rangarajan, Mahesh ^a  

^a Nehru Memorial Museum and Library   (India)

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EID: 0008558264     PISSN: 02576430     EISSN: None     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1177/025764309801400206     Document Type: Article

References (129)

1. D. Worster, Nature's Economy: The Roots of Ecology, New York, 1977;
2. K.V. Thomas, Man and the Natural World: Changing Attitudes in England, 1500–1800, Harmondsworth, 1983.
3. J.M. MacKenzie, The Empire of Nature, Hunting Parks and British Imperialism, Manchester, 1988;
4. M. Gadgil and R. Guha, This Fissured Land: An Ecological History of India, Delhi, 1992, refers to game laws but not to the war against vermin;
5. but see M. Rangarajan, Fencing the Forest: Conservation and Ecological Change in India's Central Provinces, 1860–1914, Delhi, 1996, especially pp. 138–98.
6. MacKenzie, Fencing the Forest: Conservation and Ecological Change in India's Central Provinces, 1860–1914, 1996, pp. 138–98.
7. E.R.C. Davidar, ‘Wildlife Conservation in Tamil Nadu’, Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society (henceforth JBNHS), Vol. 83, 1986, pp. 67–71.
8. S.E. Pollock, ed., The Ramayana of Valmiki: An Epic of Ancient India, Book 1: The Balakanda Princeton, 1984, p. 18; Book II: The Aranyakanda, Princeton, 1991, p. 184.
9. The lion motif was not an Islamic import as suggested by C.A. Bayly, An Illustrated History of Modern India, 1600–1947, Bombay, 1991, p. 156.
10. The wolf is less prominent in lore than either the lion or the tiger. See M. Gandhi, The Penguin Dictionary of Hindu Names, Delhi, 1992, pp. 389–90, 504–5 and 506–7.
11. Abbas Khan Sherwani, Tarikh-i-Sher Shahi, in H.M. Elliot
12. and J. Dowson, The History of India as Told by Its Own Historians, Allahabad, 1979 edn, Vol. 1, p. 316.
13. Abuʼl Fazl, The Akbar Namah, Vol. 2, trans. and ed. H. Blochmann, Calcutta, rpt, Delhi, 1972, p. 539.
14. Abuʼl Fazl, Aʼin-i Akbari, trans. and ed. H. Blochmann, Calcutta, rpt, Delhi, 1972, Vol. 2, p. 294.
15. R.M. Eaton, The Rise of Islam and the Bengal Frontier, 1204–1760, Delhi, 1994, p. 209;
16. on holy men and tigers in southern India see S. Bayly, Saints, Goddesses and Kings: Christianity and Islam in South India, 1500–1900, Cambridge, 1991, pp. 34, 121. Legends existed in Western societies (St. Francis and the Wolf of Gubio; Androcles and the Lion), but such traditions do not seem to have been a significant influence on the British in India.
17. For a later period see A. Bhattacharya, ‘The Tiger Cult and Its Literature in Lower Bengal’, Man in India, Vol. 27, 1947, pp. 44–56
18. and A. Roy, The Islamic Syncrgistic Tradition in Bengal, Princeton, 1983;
19. on Sanskrit medical texts see F. Zimmerman, The Jungle and the Aroma of Meats: An Ecological Theme in Hindu Medicine, Berkeley, 1989.
20. I. Habib and T. Raychaudhuri, eds, The Cambridge Economic History of India, Vol. 1.c.1200–1750, Delhi, 1982, p. 48.
21. Hamilton Buchanan, A Journey from Madras Through the Countries of Canara, Mysore and Malabar, London, 1807, Vol. 3, p. 75; Vol. 1, p. 383.
22. Hamilton Buchanan, A Journey from Madras Through the Countries of Canara, Mysore and Malabar, 1807, Vol. 1, pp. 178–79.
23. Reginald Heber, Narrative of a Journey Through the Upper Provinces of India from Calcutta to Bombay, 1824–25, London, 1827, rpt., Delhi, 1993, Vol. 2, pp. 14, 148.
24. W. Sleeman, Rambles and Recollections of an Indian Official, 1844, Karachi, 1980, pp. 126–27.
25. F. Braudel, Civilization and Capitalism, Fifteenth to Eighteenth Centuries: The Structures of Everyday Life, London, 1981, Vol. 1, p. 67.
26. T.C. Smout, A History of the Scottish People, 1560–1830, London, 1969, p. 131.
27. E. Zimen, The Wolf: His Place in the Natural World, London, 1981, p. 296. The wolf was extinct in England by a.d. 1500, in Scotland by 1743 and in Ireland by 1770, 310–11.
28. H. Ritvo, The Animal Estate: The English and Other Creatures in the Victorian Age, London, 1990, p. 13.
29. K.V. Thomas, Man and the Natural World: Changing Attitudes in England, 1500–1800, London, 1983, p. 274.
30. Ritvo, Animal Estate, p. 28. The lion had biblical associations and was a heraldic animal as in the crest of one of the early colleges at Oxford (Balliol) in the thirteenth century a.d.
31. N. Coutenay, Tiger: Symbol of Courage, London, 1980, p. 47. The tiger appeared as a heraldic animal in banners of two regiments of the Company Army, 52.
32. Bayly, Illustrated History, pp. 156, 159.
33. J. Forbes, Oriental Memoirs, London, 1813, Vol. 4, p. 81.
34. F. Buchanan, An Account of the District of Shahabad in 1812–13, rpt, Delhi, 1986, p. 229.
35. T. Williamson, Oriental Field Sports, London, 1807–1808, Vol. 2, p. 109.
36. Heber, Journey, Vol. 2, 15.
37. Col. J.L. Sleeman, Thug or a Million Murders, London, 1933, p. 112.
38. J. Campbell, Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, Vol. 12, Khandesh, Bombay, 1880, p. 30.
39. J. Fayrer, Destruction of Life by Wild Animals and Venomous Snakes in India, London, 1878.
40. J. Fayrer, Destruction of Life by Wild Animals and Venomous Snakes in India, No. 38, p. 4, Note, JM, 19 October 1882.
41. J. Fayrer, Destruction of Life by Wild Animals and Venomous Snakes in India No. 54, p. 47: Resn, NWP and Oudh, 2 June 1882.
42. J. Fayrer, Destruction of Life by Wild Animals and Venomous Snakes in India No. 292, F.C. Chapman, Chief Secy, Bombay Presi to Secy, GOI, 2 October 1873, no pagination.
43. J. Fayrer, Destruction of Life by Wild Animals and Venomous Snakes in India No. 50, p. 37: Chief Commr., Assam, 17 May 1882.
44. G.P. Sanderson, Thirteen Years Among the Wild Beasts of India, 1874, rpt, New Delhi, 1983, pp. 307, 312 (henceforth Game 1911).
45. Sir Guy Fleetwood Wilson, Letters to Nobody, 1908–12, London, 1921, p. 137.
46. NAI, Game 1908, No. 30, p. 329; G. Bower, Collr., Saharanpur to Chief Secy., UP, 21 July 1904.
47. NAI, Game 1911, No. 197, No. 106; Lt Gen. W. Osborn to Asst. Commr, Kulu, 20 October 1908.
48. E.P. Stebbing, ‘Review of W.S. Burke: “The Indian Shikar Field Book”’, Indian Forester, Vol. 32, 1906, pp. 220–23.
49. Anonymous, ‘The Proposed Introduction of game into the neighbourhood of Bombay’, JBNHS, Vol. 6, 1891, pp. 119–123;
50. H. Hodgson, ‘Preservation of Harmless Wild Animals in Malcompeth (Mahabaleshwar)’, JBNHS, Vol. 7, 1893, pp. 530–33.
51. OC, ‘Notes on the Otter’, Indian Forester, Vol. 19, 1893, pp. 34–35.
52. H.W. Barrow, ‘Crocodiles in Artificial Reservoirs’, JBNHS, Vol. 10, 1895, p. 144.
53. H.W. Phipson, ‘The Crocodiles in Our Reservoirs’, Letter to the Editor, The Times of India, Bombay, 16 January 1892.
54. J.M. Campbell, Gazetteer of the Bombay Presidency, Vol. XII, Part II, Thana, Bombay, 1882, rpt, Pune, 1984, pp. 44–45.
55. S.H. Prater, ‘On the Occurence of Tigers on the Island of Bombay and Salsettee’, JBNHS, Vol. 33, 1929, pp. 973–74.
56. T.J. Roberts, The Mammals of Pakistan, London, 1976, pp. 144–45.
57. Roberts, Mammals, pp. 144–45.
58. Prater, JBNHS, 1929, The last tiger in Thana was shot by the Parsi hunter J. Surti in 1929.
59. Lt. Col. O'Brien, ‘Where Man-eating Tigers Occur’, JBNHS, Vol. 45, 1945, pp. 231–32.
60. Man-eaters were also rare in the Bombay Presidency in this period. For a rare case of a man-eater in the south, R.C. Morris, ‘Miscellaneous Notes, 1, Man-eating Tigers in South India’, JBNHS, Vol. 52, 1954, p. 201.
61. K.S. Sankhala, Tiger! The Story of the Indian Tiger, London, 1978; see p. 134 on the rarity of attacks in the south in general.
62. J. Corbett, The Man-eaters of Kumaon, 1944, rpt, Delhi, 1995, pp. x–xiii.
63. S.H. Prater, ‘The Number of Tigers Shot in the Reserved Forests of India and Burma During the Year 1937–38’, JBNHS, Vol. 41, 1940, pp. 881–88. Prater was quoting a report by the Chief Conservator of Forests on the Hailey National Park in Kumaon Division.
64. C. McDougall, The Face of the Tiger, Delhi 1978. pp. 155–59. The Tarai refers to the water logged plain areas that border the foothills of the Himalayas in UP.
65. A. Singh, The Legend of the Man-eater, Delhi, 1993, pp. 81–82. The control of malaria after 1947 and the resettlement of refugees from Punjab transformed the Tarai into sugarcane fields.
66. P. Boomgaard, ‘Man-eating: The Deadly Encounters Between People and Tigers/Leopards in Indonesia, 1650–1950’, Paper Presented at the Conference on the Environment in South East Asia, School of Oriental and African Studies, London, 28–30 March 1994.
67. Forsyth, Highlands, p. 95.
68. S.P. Shahi, Backs to the Wall: The Saga of Wildlife in Bihar, Delhi, 1978, pp. 13–14.
69. C. McDougall, ‘The Man-eating Tiger in Geographical and Historical Perspective’, in R.L. Tilson and U. Seal, eds, Tigers of the World, New Jersey, 1987, pp. 435–48.
70. W.W. Hunter, A Statistical Account of Bengal, Parganas and Sundarbans, Vol. 1:24 London, 1875, Delhi, 1973, pp. 36–37, 312.
71. L.S.S. O'Malley, Bengal District Gazetteers, 24 Parganas, Calcutta, 1914, pp. 74–75.
72. L.S.S. O'Malley, Bengal District Gazetteers, Khulna, Calcutta, 1908, pp. 20, 121.
73. For recent developments of man-eaters in the Sundarbans and strategies of self-defence, see V. Rishi, ‘Man, Mask and Man-eater’, Tiger Paper, Vol. 15, 1988, pp. 9–14;
74. K. Chakraborty, Man-eating Tigers of the Sundarbans, Calcutta, 1992.
75. Prater, JBNHS, 1940.
76. V. Thapar, The Tiger's Destiny, London, 1994.
77. Of the eleven man-eaters taken by Corbett, six were male. R. Sukumar, ‘The Management of Large Mammals in Relation to Male Strategies and Conflicts with People’, Biological Conservation, Vol. 55, 1991, pp. 93–102.
78. NAI, H(P), May 1880, B, Nos 67–68. p. 4, ‘Allegation in Maharashtra Mitra about the Inability of Residents of Valva Taluka, Satara District to Defend Themselves from Attacks by Tigers for Lack of the Arms’, G.W. Kulkarni, Reporter, 20 April 1880.
79. Forsyth, Highlands, p. 28.
80. Sanderson, Thirteen Years, pp. 307, 312.
81. Forsyth, Highlands, p. 259.
82. G.P. Sanderson, Thirteen Years, pp. 237–38.
83. Zoological Survey of India, The Red Data Book of Indian Animals, Part I: Vertebrata, Calcutta, 1994, pp. 45–49. The Tibetan wolf, a different sub-species (Canis lupus chanco) is found in Ladakh and is much larger, but is tangential to this account.
84. Forsyth, Highlands, p. 68–70;
85. also see Lt. Col. E.G. Pythian Adams, ‘Jungle Memories’, JBNHS, Vol. 48, 1949, pp. 646–55.
86. Major J.W. Ray, ‘Wolf-hunting in Southern Maratha Country’, JBNHS, Vol. 8, 1893, pp. 145–48.
87. Waddington, ‘Wolf-hunting’, JBNHS, Vol. 7, 1893, pp. 554–55.
88. Forsyth, Highlands, pp. 68–70.
89. M. Krishnan, ‘The plains wolf, The Statesman, Calcutta, 15 July 1984.
90. Fayrer, 1878, p. 14. Tigers killed 828 people and wolves 1,016 in British India in 1877.
91. G. Hurst, ‘Pardhis’, Hog Hunters Annual, No. 4, 1931, pp. 49–51, p. 51.
92. C. Hobbart, ‘Pig-rearing Pasis and Kindred Clans’, Hog Hunters Annual, No. 5, 1932, pp. 22–28.
93. S.H. Prater, The Book of Indian Animals, Bombay, 1948, 1965, pp. 121, 125–26;
94. R.W. Burton, ‘Weights and Measurements of Game Animals’, JBNHS, Vol. 24, 1915, p. 16.
95. Prater, Indian Animals, pp. 121, 125–26.
96. Y.V. Jhala and R. Giles, ‘The Status and Conservation of the Wolf in Gujarat and Rajasthan, India’, Conservation Biology, Vol. 5, 1991, pp. 476–83.
97. Lady Wilson, Letters from India, London, 1911, p. 17.
98. P. Mason, A Shaft of Sunlight: Memories of a Varied Life, Delhi, 1978, p. 72.
99. E.D. (pseud.), ‘Tiger Skins’, Indian Forester, Vol. 19, 1893, p. 69. The skin of an Indian tiger was valued at 10 pounds at the time in Britain. In addition to being trophies, they were prized by Indian ascetics for use in meditation.
100. J. Budden, ‘Blackbuck versus Motor’, JBNHS, Vol. 27, 1991, p. 939.
101. Jhala and Giles, Biol. Cons., 1991, 939. Areas where the Bishnoi community protected wildlife including antelope and gazelle for religious reasons continue to harbour wolves even today.
102. Dunbar Brander, Wild Animals, p. 27.
103. Henry P. Le Mesurier, ‘Wolves’, Murwala, 21 January 1865
104. The Field, 18 March 1865, p. 185.
105. B.C. Ellison, ‘Game Preservation and Game Experiments in India’, JBNHS, Vol. 33, 1928, pp. 120–35, p. 124.
106. Sanderson, Thirteen Years, p. 269.
107. Field Marshall Birdwood, Khaki and Gown: An Autobiography, London, 1941, p. 51.
108. G.B. O'Donell, ‘Wolf Cubs’, JBNHS, Vol. 8, 1894.
109. J. Bradley, ed., Lady Curzon's India: Letters of a Vicerine, New York, 1985, p. 76.
110. Iris Butler, The Viceroy's Wife: Letters of Alice, Countess of Reading, from India, 1921–25, London, 1969, p. 151. The letter is dated November 1924. Emphasis added.
111. Wilson, Letters, pp. 144–45.
112. R.E. Vernede, An Ignorant in India, London, 1911, p. 85. Emphasis added.
113. J. Corbett, ‘The Pipal Pani Tiger’, Hog Hunters Annual, No. 4, 1931, pp. 61–62, 68.
114. Anonymous, ‘Review of J.W. Best, “Shikar Notes for Novices”’, JBNHS, Vol. 27, 1921, pp. 616–17.
115. W. Bonsels, Indian Journey, London, 1929, p. 58.
116. F.W. Champion, With a Camera in Tigerland, London, 1927, p. 45.
117. F.W. Champion, The Jungle in Sunlight and Shadow, London, 1933, p. 45.
118. P.D. Stracey, Wildlife in India: Its Conservation and Control, Delhi, 1963, p. 103.
119. C. Hayavadana Rao, Mysore Gazetteer, Descriptive, Vol. I: Mysore, 1927, rpt, Bangalore, 1984, p. 78.
120. E.G. Pythian Adams, ‘Mysore State’, in R.W. Burton, ed., Preservation of Wildlife in India, Bangalore, 1953, pp. 78–81.
121. Champion, The Jungle, p. 36.
122. C.H. Donald, ‘Birds of Prey and Their Uses’, JBNHS, Vol. 32, 1928, pp. 737–43.
123. K.S. Sankahla, Tiger! The Story of the Indian Tiger, London, 1978, p. 138.
124. S. Mukherjee, Foster and Further: The Tradition of Anglo-Indian Fiction, 1993, p. 212.
125. P. Mason, The Men Who Ruled India: The Guardians, London, 1954, rpt, 1974, p. 292.
126. The pioneering work on the colonial disjuncture is by Gadgil and Guha, This Fissured Land;
127. also see Rangarajan, Fencing the Forest, pp. 199–207.
128. Lt. Col. E.G. Pythian Adams, ‘Jungle memories’, JBNHS, Vol. 48, 1949, pp. 646–55;
129. P.D. Stracey, India's Wildlife, pp. 168, 181.