The Mangrove Man

The Amphan brings into focus my interactions with this giant who toils and believes. God as relentless as Amphan, the cyclone that has torn lives asunder.

Pranabesh Maity, the ‘Mangrove Man of Eastern India’, is a slightly built but formidable guy. The first time I met him he was dressed in a Dhoti Kurta, softly talking of his mission. We were spell bound for over an hour as he spoke of his life’s work to retrieve his home and its environs from the devastation and permanent damage wreaked by the cyclone Aila. More than 500 villages dotting the coastline were robbed of their natural cover of the mangrove plantations exposed to the wrath of the tidal waves, tigers and crocodiles now coming inland with no shelter or food. The mangrove forests lost their abundantly diverse flora and fauna, the soil being washed away by the sea.

Despite completing a Master’s degree in linguistics, he chose to work on recovering the ‘lifeline of the Sundarbans’, it’s mangrove cover. It was about planting and nurturing the mangrove saplings to prevent soil erosion. From 500 mangrove saplings in 2013 to about a lakh saplings today, it is only a tiny land that he has managed to reclaim. It is about empowering the people, giving the youth a reason to return home despite moving to the city for greener economic pastures.

He gave up a career in teaching in Kolkata to go back to the Sundarbans. Alone. With no one by his side, only to realize that his family and brethren were not aware of the seriousness of the situation. The paddy fields were seeped in saline water with the regular plants dying away. The drinking water was unpotable with extreme saltiness. He has changed the topography both physical and social, over time. Singlehandedly.

They have reinforced the embankments the barren lands becoming green with birds and bees returning to their natural habitat He involved about a thousand families in the region and the mangroves are now substantially adding to their livelihoods by bearing fruits and honey bees. I was told that one of the best and most expensive honeys of the world is produced here.

The children are taught in a school, not only the 3 r’s but about their environment, to recognize seeds and to plant trees at all available opportunities.  They are the saplings of the future to ensure that the Sunderbans can regain in totality the balanced eco-system and sustainability. Messengers of hope.

One man’s dream has gone a long way. I hear the echo of his voice still in my ears when he spoke of the dangers travelling upstream as some plants that thrive in the saline waters of the delta have been found near Kolkata. Global warming, climate changes are self evident and we turn a blind eye with complicity, snug in our cocoons, in denial that the real fears are lurking round the corner.

Pranabesh is my real life idol, completely unassuming yet absolutely powerful in what he has achieved by just following a dream to recreate and live in a home that once was paradise.