Sahyadrica

Snakes and ladders: the race to curb snakebite mortalities in Central India This longform article covers roughly 150 years of research into snakebite mortalities, snake envenomation, and the reasons of snakebite-related deaths in central Indian states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh – known to have among the highest death rate in India, majorly because of lack of effective medical care/availability of antivenom, treatment of resulting complications, time taken to reach healthcare centres, and beliefs in traditional antidotes. It also discusses the large gap in monitoring the mortalities and how researchers are innovating medical, ecological, and taxonomic studies of snakes and snakebite envenomation, tied in with my experiences of snake rescue and snake awareness in and around Kanha Tiger Reserve. This article is a part of a book on Central India, titled Our Roots Run Wild. It is available on Amazon India:  https://amzn.in/d/cvF8d60

It has been a long journey with my ever handy point-and-shoot camera. Not just in the number of days or places visited, but in number of pictures taken as well. It has been bruised and tortured in extreme climes – from the hot, humid forests of Western Ghats to the freezing cold of southern Ontario. It has been dropped on solid ground, splashed by river and rain, and been subjected to blowing sand. One day the lens cap fell into a waist-deep swamp, and after spending an hour looking for it, I had to forfeit. Albeit of all these unfortunate accidents, it is a great companion on adventures. My camera is one brilliant Sony DSC H7 that now wears a yellow plastic bottle cap as a lens cover. And I am glad I still own it! It will be its fourth anniversary this year, and to commemorate that, I have decided to write articles on subjects I photographed using this camera. Wanderer’s Eye has always focused on the photographs, but never on how they were taken, this is another reason why I am writ...