Celebrating its golden jubilee, the Wildlife Association of India (WASI), a not-for-profit society that is engaged in conservation across the Cauvery basin, along with two Bengaluru-based artistes, have come up with a podcast series Riverside Tales, sharing the unheard stories of the wild.
The first podcast from the series, which was released early in August, is narrated by voice artist and theatreperson Mario Jerome and produced by popular music producer Arvind Raj.
Anecdotes galore
Being a member-based society, WASI has spent decades exploring and observing India’s bountiful wildlife. Through this podcast, wildlife lovers will be listening to anecdotes that the association has collected along the way and inside stories that members of the association tell each other by the riverside or around a campfire. The makers of the podcast say that some of the stories are wild, some are amusing, and several are informative and awe-inspiring, but all these stories are true and gathered from members and friends of society.
Mr. Jerome has been associated with WASI through his friends for a long time now. Mr. Jerome was introduced to this initiative through his friend, conservation biologist, and member of WASI Naren Sreenivasan.
Speaking to The Hindu, Mr. Jerome says that all the stories in the podcast are based on true events, and some are picked up from WASI’s annual magazine that was run in the 1970s, “The first podcast titled Androcles in the 20th Century is a story from the 1960s that was published in WASI’s annual magazine sometime in the 1970s. The beauty of the first podcast is about how a hunter forms a bond with an injured tiger at Mavanahalla, and how it changes the way he looked at the jungle and hunting.”
Human-animal interaction
“The upcoming podcasts also talk about human and animal interactions, the rewilding process of a leopard that was captivated as a pet, and a podcast on the conservation of the Humpback Mahseer, something that Naren has dedicated his life to”, Mr. Jerome added.
WASI has about 550 members, who are nature enthusiasts from across South India. The society currently works and runs conservation projects along with the Karnataka Forest Department and the Karnataka Fisheries Department, mainly focusing on the Cauvery River basin and specifically the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary.
“As WASI is celebrating its golden jubilee, we wanted to bring back the lost stories from the magazine the society published in the 1970s and new stories too. One of the stories is based on my own experience when I caught a Humpback Mahseer back in the year 2000. That fish had me hooked, and it was one experience that pushed me into this. I now work full time on Mahseer conservation,” said Mr. Naren Sreenivasan.
Over three months
Riverside Tales has three more podcasts that will be released over the next three months. The podcasts are available for free on YouTube and Spotify. Members of WASI hope to raise funds to bring back its magazine and to bring out more such stories through podcasts and other forms of media in the coming days.
