Speaker 1: Hey, this is any and Samantha and welcome to stuff
Speaker 1: I never told your prediction of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2: And for today's feminists around the world, we're talking birds words. Well,
Speaker 2: we're talking about an Indian zoologist whose activism is in
Speaker 2: pursuit to save species of storks that are on the
Speaker 2: verge or we're on the verge of extinction. We're talking
Speaker 2: about doctor Pernima Devi Barman. And with a little bit
Speaker 2: of a content warning, we're not talking much about abuse
Speaker 2: of animals, but there is kind of mention about I
Speaker 2: guess misunderstanding of birds and an yeah, like it is
Speaker 2: about the extension of birds and her trying to stop that.
Speaker 2: So there's a little bit of all little conversation about
Speaker 2: what happened to some of the birds that she got
Speaker 2: really upset about. So there you go. Heh. So doctor
Speaker 2: o'barman's love and fascination with birds started in childhood after
Speaker 2: being sent to live with her grandmother at the age
Speaker 2: of five, she was introduced to the creatures of the
Speaker 2: nearby wetlands, where her grandmother would take her when she
Speaker 2: would get upset. There she began her journey for her
Speaker 2: love of different birds. She told the un environmental program.
Speaker 2: I saw storks and many other species. She her grandmother
Speaker 2: taught me bird songs. She asked me to sing for
Speaker 2: the egrets and the storks. I fell in love with
Speaker 2: the birds, and in another interview she did with mybirdbuddy
Speaker 2: dot Com, she tells more of how she got so
Speaker 2: interested in birds. She said, my grandmother had a solution.
Speaker 2: She was a farmer, so she took me to help
Speaker 2: in the fields, and that's when I saw the storks.
Speaker 2: I didn't know at the time that this was her geela,
Speaker 2: but they were everywhere in the pettyfields in the backyards.
Speaker 2: And to keep me busy, my grandma asked me to
Speaker 2: count the birds and taught me some songs, songs that
Speaker 2: would never go away. She saw how the solution to
Speaker 2: connection with nature help me forget to be sad, and
Speaker 2: I became normal. I've been obsessed with birds since.
Speaker 1: She would later go on to get her masters in
Speaker 1: zoology and then to pursue her PhD studying greater at
Speaker 1: jutant storks. From the same interview with my birdbuddy dot Com,
Speaker 1: she says, I am from a village where this didn't
Speaker 1: happen often at the time, but I eventually got my
Speaker 1: masters in zoology. Whilst I was doing my masters, I
Speaker 1: was very inspired by two professors who told us about
Speaker 1: conservation how to contribute, so I started volunteering at organizations
Speaker 1: and going bird watching. Meeting the bird watching community. One day,
Speaker 1: the professor said he was in a restaurant and had
Speaker 1: asked for chicken, but they gave him stork meat to
Speaker 1: cheat him. He was given hargeela meat. So that story
Speaker 1: had an impact on me. I realized I had to
Speaker 1: do something for my childhood friends, so I decided my
Speaker 1: PhD would be on them. I got a volunteer position
Speaker 1: at an NGO called Aranyak. But by this point my
Speaker 1: parents just wanted me to get married. They loved me
Speaker 1: a lot, but they said, but you know, you can
Speaker 1: still do all of this if your husband allows it.
Speaker 1: It is tradition. I don't blame them. It is just
Speaker 1: because they are worried about what their relatives, neighbors and
Speaker 1: so on will think. I actually met my husband at
Speaker 1: aaron Jak. He is also a conservationist. His family members
Speaker 1: approved of my family and we were married within one month.
Speaker 2: Right and later she started her study on the greater
Speaker 2: adjutants and According to Wikipedia, the greater Adjutants are a
Speaker 2: quote large stork listed as endangered by the IUCN Red List.
Speaker 2: It has a global population of eight hundred to twelve
Speaker 2: hundred mature individuals, with the majority of these individuals six
Speaker 2: hundred and fifty eight hundred found in Assam, India. In
Speaker 2: a psalm, this bird lives in close contact with urban areas,
Speaker 2: nests and privately owned trees, and scavenges at rubbish dumps.
Speaker 2: As a result, the greater adjutant is threatened by pollution,
Speaker 2: habitat loss and failing of nesting trees and a bit
Speaker 2: more detail. Here's a quote from all about Birds dot com.
Speaker 2: In India, the greater adjutant is now confined to the
Speaker 2: northeastern state of Assam, their last stronghold. Elsewhere, small populations
Speaker 2: persist in Cambodia's northern plains. The species is endangered. One
Speaker 2: of the rarest storks in the world. According to the
Speaker 2: International Union for Conservation of Nature, only eight hundred to
Speaker 2: twelve hundred adult Greater adjutants remain, most of them in Assam.
Speaker 2: Over the past century, these birds have been in a
Speaker 2: steep decline, but in studying this species, Barman has noticed
Speaker 2: a change in the stork's behavior. Greater adjutants are now
Speaker 2: increasingly leaving the rural wetlands where they have historically nested
Speaker 2: and becoming village dwellers.
Speaker 1: And in two thousand and seven, Barman made a difficult
Speaker 1: decision to suspend her studies to actively work to preserve
Speaker 1: the greater adjutant species. Here's some more from that All
Speaker 1: about Birds article quote. One day in two thousand and seven,
Speaker 1: Barman watched in horror as nine baby storks fell to
Speaker 1: the ground when a villager chopped down a nest tree.
Speaker 1: When she tried to stop the villager, she was taken
Speaker 1: aback by his anger. I told him how how important
Speaker 1: these scavenger birds are for our environment, and about the
Speaker 1: fact that they are so endangered, Barman recalls. He retorted
Speaker 1: in anger, saying that he couldn't keep these birds there
Speaker 1: just because I was doing my PhD. He ridiculed me
Speaker 1: and asked me to stay and work at his house
Speaker 1: as a cleaner to clean up the mess created by
Speaker 1: the birds. As other villagers gathered around her at the
Speaker 1: fallen nest street, she asked for their help in taking
Speaker 1: the baby storks to a rescue center. At a nearby zoo. Instead,
Speaker 1: the villagers started teasing and frightening the already injured little birds.
Speaker 1: They laughed at Barman, ridiculing her and asking her if
Speaker 1: she wanted to eat the baby birds on her way home.
Speaker 1: It was an incident that could have discouraged her from
Speaker 1: enlisting locals in an effort to save the storks, but instead,
Speaker 1: Barman marks it as a turning point that led to
Speaker 1: a lot of good and necessary change.
Speaker 2: Right and this is when she began to realize she
Speaker 2: needed to educate her community of the ecological importance of
Speaker 2: these storks in order to enlist their help to preserve them.
Speaker 2: That same article continues. Barman recognized that in order to
Speaker 2: enlist residents in a greater adjutant conservation, she first needed
Speaker 2: to make the stork a symbol of local pride. So
Speaker 2: she made a huge personal sacrifice, stepping away from her
Speaker 2: PhD studies to dedicate herself to shifting people's attitudes. Barman
Speaker 2: started by reaching out to several women in the villages,
Speaker 2: speaking to them about the importance of these birds and
Speaker 2: their dwindling population. She chose women as the first point
Speaker 2: of contact for her conservation outreach. Effort because she felt
Speaker 2: the women in these villages don't often get a chance
Speaker 2: to weigh in on social issues and within their families,
Speaker 2: women can serve as the gatekeepers.
Speaker 1: And with that she grew an army of women to
Speaker 1: be part of these gatekeepers slash protectors. The army is
Speaker 1: now called the Hargila Army and the number has grown
Speaker 1: from a few hundred to over ten five hundred members today.
Speaker 1: Here's a bit more information from Wikipedia about it quote.
Speaker 1: The name comes from the Sanskrit word for bone swallower.
Speaker 1: This group has over ten thousand members, including four hundred
Speaker 1: local Assamese volunteers. Their goal is to remove all obstacles
Speaker 1: that prevent Greater adjutant conservation. This movement has been credited
Speaker 1: with empowering marginalized women and giving them a voice in
Speaker 1: local conservation issues. Barman and the Hargila Army also actively
Speaker 1: rescue and rehabilitate injured Greater adjutant nestlings. Villagers place nets
Speaker 1: around nesting trees to catch nestlings if they fall out
Speaker 1: of trees on windy days, especially during monsoons, and injured
Speaker 1: nestlings are given medical treatment rehabilitated at a local zoo
Speaker 1: then released by the community. Barman has also developed an
Speaker 1: artificial breeding platform for the greater adjutant, which was successfully
Speaker 1: used to hatch a nestling in twenty nineteen.
Speaker 2: And just as the bigger significance of what they're doing,
Speaker 2: these stores have also been hunted down for their feathers
Speaker 2: obviously their meat and being used at this time, and
Speaker 2: a lot of like I wish if you have time,
Speaker 2: go go get pictures of these because they're amazing, amazing,
Speaker 2: and the women they have hats, they have hats, they
Speaker 2: have hats of the shape of these works I want
Speaker 2: to have. I need to go volunteer so I can
Speaker 2: get one of these hats. So they've done some amazing work.
Speaker 2: And when she was talking about having these women as
Speaker 2: a part of this group, you was talking about the
Speaker 2: fact that they have a spiritual connection and understand the
Speaker 2: importance of why they need to continue with these species
Speaker 2: and why extinction is so bad overall ecologically and yeah, spiritually,
Speaker 2: they really have the stepth of understanding. She was talking
Speaker 2: about a festival that happened during the Bahagavad Gita processional
Speaker 2: in her village. So having like a real connection and
Speaker 2: understanding to it and why she felt like the women
Speaker 2: were able to really grasp on to this movement. So
Speaker 2: it's beautiful in general. And yeah, since the beginning of
Speaker 2: the program, the number of nests around the area went
Speaker 2: from twenty eight to more than two hundred and fifty,
Speaker 2: making it the largest breeding of storks around the world.
Speaker 2: Of course, doctor Barman's work has brought on many accolades
Speaker 2: to her name, including but not limited to, a Whitley
Speaker 2: Award also known as the Green Oscar, the Leadership Award
Speaker 2: twenty fifteen from the Conservation Leadership Program, the UNDP India
Speaker 2: Biodiversity Award in twenty sixteen from the United Nations, and
Speaker 2: has been honored with the UN Environmental Programs twenty twenty
Speaker 2: two Champions of the Earth Award in the Entrepreneurial Vision category.
Speaker 2: And I believe she has gone back into the PhD
Speaker 2: to finish her work and complete her thesis already, So
Speaker 2: I'm excited to know more about this I've never heard of.
Speaker 2: I've seen the pictures of the stories before. I think
Speaker 2: I think like I remember them because they are very distinct,
Speaker 2: very distinct looking birds. But to see what they have
Speaker 2: done and what she has done in order to protect
Speaker 2: them is amazing.
Speaker 1: Yeah, that is really really cool, and we've talked about
Speaker 1: that before the importance of including traditionally marginalized people in
Speaker 1: these kinds of conservation efforts. So I love this and
Speaker 1: I would love to come back to it in the meantime. Listeners,
Speaker 1: If you have any suggestions for this segment, or any
Speaker 1: additional resources, thoughts, whatever, you can email us our emails
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Speaker 1: our executive producer Maya, and our contributor Joey. Thank you
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