Honey, They Shrunk Our Livelihoods!

Honey collectors gamble with their lives to eke out a livelihood in the Sundarbans, but are forced to sell it to the forest department for a pittance.

- Amrita Sen

SITTING OUTSIDE her makeshift structure in Emilibari, a small village in Satjelia Island, which is close to the Sundarban Tiger Reserve in West Bengal, Arati Haldar narrates a frightening incident. Her husband, Sujit, had left the village along with a team of mawaleys, as honey collectors are called in the Sundarbans, deep inside the dense mangrove swamps nine years ago. The group stood below a tree to collect honey, completely oblivious of the fact that they were being stalked by the deadliest predator of the forest. The tiger pounced on Sujit. He struggled with the tiger for a while and cried out for help. But his group members froze in terror and left him alone.

His battle for life soon turned into despair, as the tiger carried him away deep inside the forests. When the villagers went together in the evening to search for the remains of his body, they failed to trace him. Sujit’s family received no compensation from the Forest Department (FD) in spite of assurances. He left behind just two sacks of grain and some grocery for his wife Arati and a physically challenged son. Sujit is one among many honey collectors who risk their lives for a livelihood in the Sundarbans. Honey collectors, in fact, have a popular saying: “Modhu khoja mane bagh khoja” (finding honey equates finding a tiger).

Risk-ridden life

The Sundarban Biosphere Reserve (SBR) is spread over 9,630 sq km. Out of this, the forest cover is 4,263 sq km including the core and the buffer areas. The rest 5,367 sq km of the SBR is the transition zone, divided into 19 inhabited blocks in the North and South 24 Parganas districts. Each block is further divided into islands, which are crisscrossed by a maze of distributed waterways and narrow creeks in these dense forests. Around 4.5 million people inhabit these 19 blocks.