The yellow-beaked, doe-eyed mynah took off from the windowsill of my Pune flat and dived nimbly into the gulmohars and rain trees, triggering fond memories of the canopy of rain trees that shaded the road from my house to the department where I worked for 25 years in Mumbai. The riveting beauty of nature inscribed itself all over the campus of the IIT, Powai, spread over 120 acres, 44 km from the din of South Mumbai. Nature expressed itself fully only after the institute landscaped it. An elderly colleague used to say, “Compare it with the barrenness outside.”
Birds, reptiles, humans and other creatures coexisted in the middle of pristine beauty. The lakeside was home to migratory birds in winter. Baby crocodiles cockily sunned themselves on the dry lakebed in summer. A lost leopard cub was sighted by hostellers, trying to climb inside. Snakes slithered across the quiet roads, undisturbed by traffic.
A dense forest of centuries-old trees stood in the cordoned conservation area.
In such mesmerising natural surroundings, there was not a soul who didn’t walk, jog or run. From the day I went to live there to the last, I had to walk my 45 minutes.
One day, as I left home at 5.30 a.m., a one-horned black bull, grazing in the field by the road, sighted me and began to run swiftly towards me. Retreat was impossible. I stood rock still, not looking at it, but expecting the worst. As suddenly as it had begun, it stopped — a few feet from me. A minute later, it began to amble to the other side. A village woman collecting dung came close and said excitedly in Marathi, “It would’ve killed you!”
Fifteen years on, I had another menacing encounter. It was monsoon and raining. It had grown darker, but I was restless. Midway, it began pouring, and I was drenched. My clothes stuck to me but I was alone on the road. So I continued.
The solar bulbs lit the road dimly as the breeze flitted in and out of the trees, lifting the leaves. Just as I was about to step on the speed breaker, a long slate-coloured, broad sword-like snake leapt in the air right in front of me and darted into the thick bushes. “Phew!” I hadn’t seen it. “Saved!” I completed my walk.
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Published - August 15, 2021 12:37 am IST
