Brownian Movements

  The leopard is a magnificent animal. Of all the great cats the leopard stands out, beautifully proportioned, agile, ferocious, cunning and a survivor, adapts well to any terrain as well as human onslaughts. Be it forests, scrub-lands, rocky mountains or even the frigid Himalayas, leopards thrive everywhere. The female F 2 Leopards are elusive creatures and a mere sight of them is considered lucky. In certain terrains, however, for example, rocky mountains with scrub vegetation, it is easier to see them as they inhabit caves that abound in the rocks and then they may be seen for extended periods of time. One such place is Jawai, in Pali district of Rajasthan where leopard safaris have become very popular in the past few years. The Jawai bandh leopard conservation reserve was notified in 2010, and covers approximately 20 square kms area. It has a high density of leopards with an estimated 50 to 60 individuals. Most of this land is privately owned with resorts in the core are...

 I hadn’t expected to find a forgotten Ottoman graveyard in a small town in Rajasthan. Yet there it was — quiet, neglected, and holding stories from a war fought more than a century ago. Sumerpur, a small town in the Pali district of Rajasthan, lies on the north bank of the Jawai River. Established in 1912 and named after Maharaja Sumer Singh of Jodhpur, it is today better known as a base for the leopard safaris of Jawai. Few visitors, however, are aware that this unassuming town once housed a prisoner-of-war camp during the First World War. In 1915, at the request of the British government, the Maharaja of Jodhpur permitted a POW camp to be set up in Sumerpur to hold Ottoman prisoners captured during the war. The camp stood on a vast plain bordered by rocky hills and intersected by the Jawai River — a river that ran dry in summer, before the earthen dam (constructed between 1946 and 1957) transformed the region’s water supply. According to historical records, the camp held o...