Extended Response: Interview [0990/12, March 2022]
Text C:
The
wild tigers of Ranthambore The narrator, Val, is a photographer, author and
documentary filmmaker. He has spent over 45 years living, working and
campaigning at the tiger reserve in Ranthambore National Park, near the town of
Sawai Madhopur (SM). In this extract from his book, Val remembers first
travelling to the area by train from his city home as a young man in 1976.
Exiting the deserted station, I
woke up the driver of a solitary horse-drawn carriage.
In those days Sawai Madhopur (SM)
boasted few motorised vehicles. The town wasn’t prosperous. Numerous taxi-jeeps
and buses taking chattering tourists into the park were still figments of shiny
future ambition. Garish hotel chains were yet to sprout, mushrooming along
newly surfaced roads to the park. This was a sleepy town, sprawled untidily
around the railway track, the only reason for its existence.
Since then, local painters have
decorated the station walls. Now murals of our tigers and other wildlife engage
curious passers-by, increasing awareness like a kind of open-air art museum.
Back in 1976, we trotted off to
the only guesthouse nearby. A reluctant proprietor prised open a musty room. I
spent a sleepless night.
Next morning, I introduced myself
to Fateh, the wildlife warden for the park. He looked over his luxuriant
moustache disbelievingly at me and my camera. No one came here, he told me, to
‘visit’.
Jolting along dirt tracks, we
drove out towards the reserve. Slowly the wilderness took over. I scanned the
thickening forest for wildlife, unaware my tracking skills would take years to
develop.
My first days felt like shedding
one layer of skin and growing into another. As you track a tiger, the language
of the jungle envelopes you in its folds. You’re alert to the tension in every
rustling leaf, in every impression on the ground. Animal tracks whisper stories
of the night. You’re a jungle detective seeking clues of tigers having padded
past. In the early years, just a paw-print was cause for celebration. There
were still villages everywhere; human disturbance was high.
Until the 1980s, there were few
pictures of tigers in the wild. Even then tourism to the area was only just
starting, driven by Fateh’s determination to make Ranthambore the most
important wildlife destination in the world. My pictures of tigers like Noon
drew multitudes to the forests of Ranthambore, transforming the local economy.
People in the area owed their improving prospects to Noon.
Noon had been a tigress who
filled my senses. Fateh teased me – saying I’d fallen in love with a tigress.
Whenever I arrived in her presence there was a quick look of recognition. Most
of the time it was just her and me with my camera.
Visiting research-scientists
warned me to keep detached, not humanise tigers, but Noon grew into a pleasant
obsession, deepening my understanding of the secret life of tigers. I don’t
think I experienced such closeness with a tiger again. Back then I could drive
out alone and watch tigers in solitude. There were fewer rules, fewer visitors
asking to join me. Even today, traversing the lakes which were at the heart of
her territory, I can summon up images of Noon slicing through their waters or
erupting from a grassy bank in incredible pursuits of deer or wild boar –
lmages that remain etched on my mind.
Sometimes when hunting, Noon
would look skywards and follow the direction vultures took. Visitors are still
fascinated today by film of her tracking low-flying vultures, trotting from
lake to lake until she found the carcass of a deer. Back then, I explain,
Ranthambore was full of white-backed vultures, before chemicals used for
injecting livestock and ingested by these scavenging birds wiped them out.
Nature lost a cleaning service. Noon lost her food-finders.
I last saw Noon in 1990 beside
Ranthambore lake. She looked older. Tigers get paler with age. The sun was
setting, its last rays framing her in golden light. By this time, she’d successfully
raised two litters and delighted the world with our footage of her kills,
racing into the shallows of the lakes, causing chaos amongst grazing deer and
more often than not bringing one down. The tourist boom followed – thanks to
Noon – with no shortage of high-profile visitors keen to promote the cause of
wild tigers.
Question
Question 3
You are Fateh. Following the
release of Val’s book about his experiences at Ranthambore and the work you
have both been doing there, you are interviewed for a national television show.
Write the words of the interview. Base your interview on what you have read in Text C, but be careful to use your own
words. Address each of the three bullets.
Suggested Answers
3
A1: what Ranthambore offers
visitors; what viewers might like about Ranthambore if they visited and what
sort of thing could they do there
•
tiger reserve (det. wild tigers) [dev.
rare opportunity / reassurance of doing good – protecting tigers]
•
wilderness (det. jungle / forest) [dev.
may be able to go tracking with an expert / kept safe by rules / contrast with
town or city]
•
range of other wildlife (det. deer, boar) [dev. can
no longer see vultures / creatures are in natural habitat]
•
lakes (det. several bodies of
water, Ranthambore lake) [dev. beautiful views of sunset / might witness a
hunt]
•
education (det. secret life of tigers,
Val’s explanations, Val’s book) [dev. lectures (from Val) / results of
scientific research]
•
films (det. of tiger hunting /
following vultures) [dev. amazing footage / may get first-hand experience of things
they have seen on film or TV]
A2: the various different people and animals associated with Ranthambore
and how Fateh feels they and he have contributed to Ranthambore’s success
•
local artists (det. painters, created
murals) [dev. show of support / drew attention to the park and its work]
•
Val (det. author, photographer,
documentary film maker) [dev. commitment to campaign over time]
•
Noon (det. two litters) [dev.
beautiful animal / became famous / iconic / part of breeding programme / no
longer living / descendants carry on her legacy]
•
scientists (det. research) [dev.
credibility for park]
•
own contribution (to make Ranthambore most
important wildlife destination in the world) (det. park warden) [dev. worked
with Val / teamwork / pride at achievements over time]
•
high profile visitors (det. lots of VIPs) [dev.
may be doing it to further their own career / campaign gathered strength and
acceptance]
A3: how
and why SM has changed since 1976
•
station (det. used to be deserted,
used to be the only reason the town was there) [dev. more welcoming / become an
attraction in its own right]
•
transport (det. taxi jeeps and buses
now, newly surfaced roads, previously horse-drawn carriage) [dev. better
equipped to deal with volume / more convenient / modernised / increased traffic
is too much]
•
hotels (det. only one guesthouse
nearby previously, chains of hotels now) [dev. increased need for more
accommodation / hoteliers now more welcoming and obliging / overly
commercialised]
•
tourists (det. numbers of visitors
increased) [dev. proximity of park and its growing popularity attracted people
to the town too / tourists were not impressed by the town as it was, so it had
to change / tourists overwhelming local culture
•
economy boomed (det. not prosperous before)
[dev. tourists spent money / created a market for local businesses to grow,
more jobs for locals]
Comments
Post a Comment