The Divisional Forest Officer of Katarniaghat Akash Badhawan is changing the lives of human beings and animals residing in Katarniaghat, drawing parallels between Vidya Balan in the film ‘Sherni’ where she was also changing lives for the better.
The Daily Guardian spoke to Badhawan and got to know how they are working and changing the lives of everyone related to Forest.
The children only had used copies in their hands which meant that only oral studies were the hope for them and this initiative was started by Satyendra Kumar, Sub-Inspector of the Special Tiger Protection Force of the Katarniaghat Wildlife Sanctuary under the Dudhwa Tiger Reserve. He was teaching about 20 children during his free time at the Motipur Forest Range Office campus. The strength of kids was reduced to 4-7. Then he was promoted and asked newly joined Divisional Forest Officer Akash Badhawan to look after these little ‘Mowglis’. The destiny of Mowgli School changed and new dawn knocked on the door of these Mowglis.
“When my wife Tanya and I first interacted with these kids, they were very fascinated that someone had come to meet them. Well, over biscuits that we gave them, the ice was broken and I asked them what games would they like to play at our fairly big garden of the Motipur Range Office and Eco-Tourism Centre. They slowly started speaking up, to my wife mostly, and some kids wanted footballs, some wanted carrom boards, some girls wanted ludo sets and some kids even wanted Hindi storybooks. Within 2 days, I got these kids footballs, carrom boards, badminton sets, and some basic books to begin with,” says Divisional Forest Officer, IFS Akash Badhwan.
“To our surprise, a group of about 50 kids showed up the next day at 5 AM to play games at the Range Office. Slowly, word started spreading and these kids increased in numbers. The DFO had deputed the Sanctuary’s Veterinarian to teach these kids basic Hindi, Maths, and English along with a 30 minutes session on the animals found in the forests and slowly about Man-Animal Conflict and what to do in such cases,” adds Badhawan.
The projector room used for field meetings is used once a month to show these kids some movies andYouTube videos about nature and wildlife conservation. The officer added that they are setting up Eco-Development Committees where people from these villages and parents of these Mowgli school kids are trained.
“In years to come, who knows our Mowgli School kids might become wildlife photographers, conversationalist and officers,” says Badhawan.
Along with children, even teenager kids have started coming to the school. It helps the Forest Department in mob management in such Man-Animal negative interfaces.