Local people firm on protecting Deepar Beel

GUWAHATI, February 4: Deepar Beel, the lone Ramsar site of the State and second of the kind in the Northeast region, after Loktak in Manipur, can be saved from degradation only with the help of the local fishermen who have been depending on the beel traditionally for centuries. For these are the people who regard the beel as their Goddess of wealth and the source to continue their life and culture. Unlike the greedy land grabbing members of the society's elite section, these people are against any attempt at turning the beel area in to a 'developed area' as has been proposed time to time by some forces of 'civilisation', who are after colonising the domains of nature as did the Fascists in Abyssinia under Mussolini in the 1940s. The beel, which is regarded as the kidney of Guwahati city by the environmentalists, is a home of hundreds of varieties of aquatic flora and fauna. It was accorded the recognition of a major wetland of national importance a few years back and the recognition of a Ramsar site too about a year back considering its importance in ecology. The status of a Ramsar site to the beel suggests that it is one of those globally important wetlands which have been playing a major role in the conservation of ecosystem on the earth. The name Ramsar site come into being after the signing of the 1971 international agreement on wetland conservation in Ramsar city of Iran. The beel is also one of those wetland in the State which attract varieties of species of migratory birds. With its location and system, the beel has also the potential to be developed into a major tourist destination. An extensive natural reservoir of riverine origin the beel proper has an area of 10.1 sq km. But together with the adjoining wetland, the beel area extends up to about 40 sq km. Geologically, the Deepar Beel region forms a part of the Shillong Plateau of the Pre-Cambrian age. The adjoining highlands of the beel as well as the city area of Guwahati, are primarily made up of granites, gneisses and schist. The beel and the adjoining valleys are underlain by the recent alluvium consisting of clay, silt, sand and pebble. Its older pre-Cambrian basement in concealed under the alluvium. Originally, the beel has its natural linkage with the Brahmaputra through the Borhola Beel and the swampy areas of Pandu to the Northeast. But, due to the construction of NH 37 and civil works like residential buildings, the earlier link has already been disturbed, said geographers who have been studying the beel system. According to P C Bhattacharyya of the Zoology Department of Gauhati University (GU), who is also a member of the Technical and Policy Core Group of the National Biodiversity Strategy and Action plan, more than 122 species of residential and migratory birds are seen in the beel. During the winter, the number of birds in the beel goes up to between 10,000 and 20,000. While the residential birds use the beel also as their breeding place, the migratory ones use it for wintering purposes, he said. The wild elephants of the adjacent forest areas also come to the beel for the purposes of eating the aquatic vegetation and merry making, said Bhattacharyya. The residential birds of the beel include the endangered species like the Greater Adjutant Stork (Bartokola), Lesser Adjustant Stork (Hargila), Black Stork, Cotton Teal and Kora, while the migratory birds coming to the beel include the endangered species like the Bar headed geese, the Greylegged geese, the Shoveller, the Baer's Pochard, the Brahminy Duck, the Wigeon and the Gadwall. Apart from the above, the migratory birds also include the Pintail, the Garganey, the Spotbill Duck, the Common Pochard, the Common Teal, the Grebes and the Indian River Term, Bhattacharyya said. The dominant aquatic plants of the beel include the Eichhornia crassipes, Pistia stratiotes, Lemna minor, Vallisneria spiralis, Azolla pinneta, Spirodella polyrrhiza, Trapa bispinosa, Nelumbo nucisera and Nelumbo lotus. Most important of the flora species found in the beel is however the Giant water Lily Euryale ferox locally known as the Dangarpatar Bhetphul, while the dominant tree plant species in the nearby deciduous forest include the Tectona grandis the Ficus bengalensis and the Bombax malabaricum, Bhattacharyya said. The Giant water Lilly is of considerable botanical interest besides its seeds being used for economic purposes, he said. The beel is also a habitat of the fishes like Labeo rohita (i.e. Rohu, Labeo gonius, Notopterus chitola (i.e. Chitol, Channa striatus and Wallago attu (i.e. Barali) among others. Though the State Forest Department declared the beel as a Wildlife Sanctuary a few years back taking around 4 sq km area of the beel proper as the core area, the attempt did not succeed in bringing about a remarkable change in matters of conservation of the beel system because of the lack of a mechanism for ensuring more participation of local people in the greater interest of the conservation of the whole ecosystem, Bhattacharyya observed. Hence, the need of the hour, he said, is to develop the beel as a biosphere reserve area with the greater participation and involvement of the people traditionally, living around the beel, for better management, maintenance and protection of the unique biodiversity of the area.