Four snake catchers from Assam make journal hiss-tory
The Hindu
An electrician, an automobile dealer, an airport worker and an Indian Air Force employee in Assam get recognition with published papers on serpents
GUWAHATI
Snakes have made four non-herpetologists of Assam get into science journals.
Independent of each other, Indian Air Force employee Chitra B. Tamang, automobile dealer Mathuranath Dey, electrician Bappi Majumder, and Guwahati airport worker Milu Medhi have been “rescuing” snakes from human habitations for years. A few weeks ago, they were brought together in the pages of Reptiles & Amphibians, a leading scientific journal.
Mr. Dey and Mr. Majumder, both 35-year-olds were the co-authors in two studies — one on the first confirmed record of the Bengalese kukri snake from Assam, and the other on king cobras. The 45-year-old Mr. Tamang and the 42-year-old Mr. Medhi co-authored a paper on a rare case of venom-spitting by the monocled cobra.
Reptile specialist Jayaditya Purkayastha, who runs the conservation-based Help Earth and anchored the papers, said the recognition for the quartet of “so-called non-experts” would be beneficial for the world of science in the long run.
“Most of us biologists do more lab work than field work. The snake rescuers, who handle the reptiles out of passion, have very valuable data that we are losing out, especially about the diversity of snakes in a local area,” he said.
“Their data is important to understand the ratio of venomous to non-venomous species and accordingly develop public awareness programmes. There are even possibilities of uncovering never-before-seen snake species, adding to the checklist of the places they operate,” he said.