But no. Ramavtaar is gesturing emphatically
towards the hut, happiness etched in the
lines around his eyes, a smile clear beneath
his balaclava. I find myself leaning forwards
in the safari truck, waiting for his tale.
Ramavtaar used to call this cabin home.
He began patrol work in Madhya Pradesh’s
Bandhavgarh National Park when he was
19, using the watch-post as a base from
which to protect the park. More than
45 years on, he guides rather than guards,
but when the monsoon hits and the reserve
closes to tourists, he returns to this hut,
deep in the heart of the jungle.
“I prefer tigers for neighbours,” he
shrugs, pointing out fresh tracks in the
roadside. Each paw is saucer-sized and I
stare, awestruck, as Ramavtaar reminisces
about a time when a 500lb beast leapt from
a thicket, snatching the scarf from around
his neck before melting back into the
bush. “Perhaps he was cold,” he chortles.
“I can move so silently through the forest
that people call me ‘the ghost’, but nothing is
stealthier than the tiger.”
A cold winter dawn is breaking on
Bandhavgarh: blood-red stains are seeping
into the sky and, all around us, wildlife
is stirring. Babblers begin the morning’s
symphony, white-bellied minivets adding
their short, sharp burst to the tune. Soon
the canopy’s orchestra is in full swing,
with quails cooing and rollers calling
— Mother Nature conducting a wild
jungle song.
This is India’s untamed heartland, where
the looming, pine-crested Satpura Range
dissolves into Kanha’s grasslands to the
east and the dense forests of Bandhavgarh
to the north. There are 11 national parks
in Madhya Pradesh, more than any
other Indian state, and these pockets of
wilderness are fiercely protected, their flora
and fauna wonderfully diverse.
We turn away from the watch-post
and rattle up another rocky peak.
Bamboo thickets become denser, and the
eyes of unknown creatures follow us from
the undergrowth before the track spits us
out at an ancient stone ruin. Piece by piece,
nature is devouring the structure, the once-
mighty columns cracked and crumbling,
the floor subsiding and slick with moss.
This palace was once a holiday home
with a very different purpose, a place from
which the maharajas of Madhya Pradesh
could stalk big cats. Although it hasn’t
been inhabited since the 14th century,
Bandhavgarh was used as a hunting ground
as recently as the 1960s.
Local folklore has long deemed the killing
of tigers auspicious — a display of strength
and dedication to Shiva, god of destruction.
The creatures were almost completely
wiped out in Bandhavgarh, with numbers
falling to as low as 11 by some counts, and it
wasn’t until 1968, when the last maharaja of
Rewa became racked with guilt over killing
a pregnant tigress, that the park was gifted
to the Indian government.
Bandhavgargh now has a healthy
population of 79 tigers, and its remarkable
success story has been mirrored across
the state, including in Kanha National
Park — my next stop. The reserve served
as Rudyard Kipling’s inspiration for
The Jungle Book and, on our first drive, I spot
Baloo. He ambles slow and soft-footed past
the car, long black hair gleaming, eyes the
colour of coal, with a comical white muzzle
as though he’s broken into a larder and
helped himself to some cream.
“He’s after gooseberries,” says Uday,
one of the park’s naturalists. “It’s that
time of year. He’ll then move onto black
plums and, in August, when the monsoon
hits, it’ll be termite time.” I look past the
sloth bear, out across the vast expanse of
rippling grassland, punctuated by termite
towers rising 6ft tall. Kanha’s topography
couldn’t be more different to Bandhavgarh,
its steep ridges replaced with open plains
where barasingha deer glance up from their
breakfasts, startled, as we rumble past.CLOCKWISE FROM TOP: Rock pool,
Satpura National Park; sloth bear,
Bandhavgarh National Park; grey
langur male keeping an eye out
for danger
PREVIOUS PAGE: Male tiger,
Bandhavgarh National ParkHe must be joking. The tiny wooden
structure looks like little more than a
shed, balanced on the cliff’s edge with
a 500ft drop in place of a porch and
40sq miles of jungle for a garden.
IMAGES: GETTYPARTNER CONTENT FOR MADHYA PRADESH TOURISM