Mrigdesh

Chapter 2

1

1IMAGINE!

Just try and imagine give a free rein to your mind, do not discount that what seems impossible can become possible. Believe nature is full of twists and surprises, and it is not just man alone of the living creatures that can shape the entire history.

Just imagine the following sequence of events:

The animals of the forests, at some point in time, shocked into realization that man is pushing them dangerously close to the brink of extinction, come together and embark upon an ambitious fight for freedom.

The animals, while on this path, rediscover the art of speaking in one language, and through engaging in a purposeful communication across species, discover the power of joint action.

The animals, though with limited capacity to plan and execute when compared to man, still manage to come together and engage in a heroic struggle for freedom.

The animals, in the end, emerge successful in their fight for freedom and reclaim their living spaces.

Just try and imagine a time and place in the world where things as such have come to pass and that there in that world:

Exist pockets of deep forest spaces where animals hold the sway, where they rule, where their writ alone runs, and where it is their will that prevails.

A nation has been carved out for and by the animals and is ruled much in the manner man does with rights and responsibilities.

There is now more equality and balance between all animals, man and animals in particular.

Man, in his wisdom and compassion, has graciously (though a little grudgingly) let it be thus

Well, it may sound like I ask a bit too much of you. I won’t blame you if you react the same way, as when an imaginative child runs up to you and says a spaceship has landed in your backyard, but I must persist and go on. You see, ever since our civilization dawned, from the time we became better hunters with weapons such as cudgels and spears, we have been a domineering species. We have driven many animals to extinction or near to it, even if they are much larger and stronger than us, the mammoth for example; some animals have been won over and made slaves, and the remaining driven deeper and deeper into the wilderness. Step by step, they were made to retreat, and conquered by our subjugating will, as does the ringmaster with nothing more than a whip. Their living spaces we have taken over, and ordained them into villages, farmland, towns, and cities, leaving only a niggardly portion as forest for the animals to crowd in; and punished them with utmost severity at the times they strayed out from within. Worse, as our civilization progressed, our harassment has grown further, and we have begun deadly raids into their homes maiming and killing them just for sport-indeed, often turning their own kind to hunt for us. Later on, with the march of our civilization, we have become squatters in their homes for the greed of the wealth hidden there.

Nonetheless, the animals have so far put up with all these transgressions and violations. But as they are slowly pushed to the brink, don’t you think it is possible that one day it will all come to a boil, which will trigger some extraordinary rebellious response from them, something which our scientists have not yet predicted? And that the outcome of this, as the dust settles down, could well be this WORLD? We do know every animal when cornered fights back with an energy that it can find only when at the end of its tether; but isn’t it also possible, that one day when all animals perceive a collective threat, a collective back to the wall fight will erupt? More than enough provocation already exists to aggravate even the timidest, and all that it probably requires is a trigger. It could so happen (however remote the possibility) that a series of quickly cascading man-caused events occurs, all causing a grievous negative impact on the animals, culminating to a flashpoint that unleashes a sudden retaliatory explosive force of unimaginable intensity. And why shouldn’t it be in the form of the animals getting together, revolting, and seeking freedom?

I do agree that the freedom struggle will not come over as a one of kind response to an oppressive situation. The process will require more than just one simple trigger. It will not happen in a day or two or happen as smoothly as day follows night. Yes, freedom struggles are protracted affairs, and they require endless sacrifices, doggedness, courage and unity. But yet, to begin with, this is all I ask of you, to concede this possibility so that I can proceed with my tale.

You laugh at me, assail me with a thousand arguments, facts and theory, all backed by the great authority of the accumulated human knowledge obtained through scientific enquiry, the most trusted philosophy of modern man. “With individual animals,” you say, “yes, it happens very often, almost invariably. The wild boar or even the timid stag will cause injuries, even kill sometimes. When cornered, they have the weapons for it, but all the animals coming together? Well, well, well! That is nothing but fantasy, a fairy tale, a fable. As I said, skirmishes with individual animals lead sometimes to injury-even to death, but eventually, the animals will invariably be the losers. “And this joint action possibility, all the animals banding together, an animal civil disobedience movement, if I may so call it, a remote possibility. Yes, maybe in a million years from now. But this will be by an individual animal species which evolves and challenges man. But this oranges and apples coming together to protect their orchard — well this is a childish story, a new nursery rhyme…”

No, do not dismiss this so easily, I am not done yet. Human beings, a few hundred years ago, never had an idea of how different this world would be. To them, things like heavier than air flight, instant communication across the globe, and nuclear weapons were the stuff of fables and mythology. They would have never dreamt of things like telecommunication, satellites around earth, the computer, the internet-all that you now take for granted. Even today, we all accept as legitimate aspirations, and dare dream of travel to distant parts of the universe, though we have no means to do so as of now or in the foreseeable future — a journey that would take hundreds, thousands of years even when travelling at speed of light. Yet you dismiss this possibility, a dream or longing, which lies unexpressed in the heart of every animal (I am sure) as fantasy. Is this fair? If you have so much faith in the power of humans to achieve things beyond your imagination, why not accept the same to be true of animals too?

All my arguments are in vain. You dismiss my story as pure nonsense, not worthy of any further comment. “An outcome of an imagination of a febrile mind,” I can imagine you saying under your breath. “Outpourings of a frustrated wilderness and animal lover who feels genuinely sorry at their growing plight that stems from the general helplessness of his kind in not being able to do anything about it,” maybe you charitably add, but no more.

Well, I have to try one more weapon and I must use it, lure you into my time machine and take you forward to a time a little ahead into the future: to kidnap you, to put you into a time capsule in which you will hibernate, and wake when it opens sometime in the distant future. There, in this marvellous brave new world, which we all know will be totally different and changed from what you know it to be, you will wander and wonder at the unbelievable, incomprehensible, and unimaginable changes man with his technology has wrought. There, in this world you may find that to our children of the future, there is nothing strange in words like animal zone, animal kingdom, animal country, animal nation (all of which means the same) because they physically already exist; and matters like how it came to be, how their forefathers sometime in the past conceded the forest space to the animals, how sovereignty and self-rule were granted, are all but a matter of hoary history.

If this is how it is in the future, you will have no choice but to swallow your disbelief, reconcile, and accept the wonder of the animal nation as just another wonder along with the so many other man-conceived, breathtaking ones of this future. Maybe you may even find it to be so minuscule, the achievement of the animals, and far easy to comprehend, compared to the marvels man has created. You will thus return from the future softened up a bit, your objections, hopefully, overcome. Stretch your imagination only this much, for the length of time you read this book. Just pretend that you are back from such a future, suspend your judgment, and for the sake of animals believe it will happen; for faith and belief can create miracles or something near to it.