Ritayan Mukherjee

Photos and Text

P. Sainath

Editor

Urja

Video

Binaifer Bharucha

Photo Editor

large_01-_AMI1421-RM-Jamnagars_swimming_camels_in_deep_waters.jpg

medium_01-_AMI1421-RM-Jamnagars_swimming_camels_in_deep_waters.jpg

small_01-_AMI1421-RM-Jamnagars_swimming_camels_in_deep_waters.jpg

thumbnail_01-_AMI1421-RM-Jamnagars_swimming_camels_in_deep_waters.jpg

01-_AMI1421-RM-Jamnagars_swimming_camels_in_deep_waters.jpg

“Please don&#39;t go too close to them. They might get scared and run away. Then it will be a tedious job for me to even find them in this vast area – let alone regulate their movement,” says Jethabhai Rabari.‘Them’ and ‘they’ are the prized camels the pastoral nomad is talking about. And they’re swimming around in search of food. Camels? Swimming? Really? Well, yes. The ‘vast area’ Jethabhai is referring to is the Marine National Park and Sanctuary (MNP&amp;S) which lies along the southern coast of the Gulf of Kachchh. And here, herds of camels tended by nomadic pastoralist bands do <a href="https://ruralindiaonline.org/en/articles/the-endless-search-for-grazing-grounds/">swim from island to island</a> searching for mangroves (Avicennia marina) – essential to their diet. “If these breeds don&#39;t eat mangroves for a prolonged period, they can get sick, weaken and even die” says Karu Meru Jat. “So inside the marine park, our herds of camels move around looking for mangroves.&quot;

<a href="https://www.researchgate.net/publication/321262339_Changing_Landscape_of_Marine_National_Park_and_Sanctuary_Gulf_of_Kachchh_Ecological_Assessment_of_Mangroves_and_Coral_Reefs">The MNP&amp;S comprises 42 islands</a> of which 37 fall under the Marine National Park and the remaining 5 come under the Sanctuary area. The whole zone stretches across the districts of Jamnagar, Devbhumi Dwarka (carved out of Jamnagar in 2013) and Morbi, in the region of Saurashtra, Gujarat.“We have all lived here for generations,” says Musa Jat. Like Karu Meru, he’s a member of the Fakirani Jat clan living within the Marine National Park. There’s one more group like his residing within the MNP&amp;S – the Bhopa Rabari (also spelt as Rebari) clan to which Jethabhai belongs. Both groups are traditional herders, called ‘maldhari’ here. In the Gujarati language ‘mal’ refers to animals, and ‘dhari’ means guardian or possessor. Across Gujarat, the maldharis rear cows, buffaloes, camels, horses, sheep and goats. I’m meeting members of both these groups who live in villages along the periphery of the marine park that are home to around 1,200 people. “We do value this land,” says Musa Jat. “The Raja of Jamnagar invited us to settle here ages ago. Long before this place was declared a marine national park in 1982.”

That’s a claim Rituja Mitra of the NGO Sahjeevan, which runs the Centre for Pastoralism in Bhuj, backs up. “It is said that a prince of the region escorted groups of both clans to his newly formed kingdom of Navanagar, later to be known as ‘Jamnagar’. And since then, the descendants of those pastoralists have been dwelling on these lands.“The names of a few villages in these regions also suggest they’ve been around a long while,” says Rituja who is the state coordinator, Forest Rights Act, at Sahjeevan. “One such village is Unthbet Shampar – which roughly translates as &#39;Island of Camels’.” Besides, the camels must have been here a very long time to have evolved as swimmers. As researcher Lyla Mehta of the Institute of Development Studies at Sussex <a href="https://gizmodo.com/the-fight-to-save-the-last-swimming-camels-on-earth-1829654888">puts it</a>: “Why would the camels be able to swim if they did not coexist with mangroves traditionally?” There are some 1,184 camels that might graze within the MNP&amp;S, Rituja tells us. And these are owned by 74 maldhari families. Jamnagar was founded in 1540 CE as the capital of the then princely state of Navanagar. The maldharis first came here at some point in the 17th century and have been here, they say, ever since.

It’s not difficult to see why they “do value this land.” Especially if you are a pastoral nomad who understands and lives with the astonishing marine diversity here. The park includes coral reefs, mangrove forests, sandy beaches, mudflats, creeks, rocky coastline, seagrass beds and more.The uniqueness of this ecoregion is well documented in a <a href="https://snrd-asia.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/CMPA-Technical-Report-Series-No.-53.-Review-of-Status-of-Marine-National-Park-Jamnagar-Evolving-a-Vision-Statement-for-Management-of-MNP.pdf">2016 research paper</a> published by the Indo-German Biodiversity Programme, GIZ. The area is home to over 100 species of algae, 70 species of sponges, and over 70 kinds of hard and soft corals. That’s besides 200 types of fish, 27 kinds of prawns, 30 types of crabs and four varieties of seagrasses. Nor does it end there. As the paper records: you can also find here, three species each of sea turtles and sea mammals, more than 200 sorts of molluscs, over 90 types of bivalves, 55 kinds of gastropods, and 78 species of birds. Here, the Fakirani Jats and Rabaris have grazed Kharai camels for generations. ‘Kharai’ in Gujarati means ‘salty’. The Kharai camel is a special breed that has successfully acclimatised to an ecozone very different from those you’d normally associate with camels. Their diet includes various plants, shrubs, and very importantly, as Karu Meru Jat tells us, mangroves. These animals – the only dromedaries known to swim – are accompanied by a team of herders from the particular maldhari unit or clan that owns them. That normally consists of two maldhari men who swim alongside the camels. Sometimes, one of them uses a small boat to ferry food and drinking water, and also to return to the village. The other herder stays on the island with the animals, where he supplements his light meals with camel milk, an essential part of their community’s diet.

For the maldharis, though, things are changing fast – for the worse. “It’s getting harder to sustain ourselves and our occupation,” says Jethabhai Rebari. “Our grazing ground has shrunk with more and more of this area being brought under forest department control. Earlier, we used to have open access to the mangroves. Since 1995, grazing has been banned. Then there are the salt pans that trouble us. Besides, there’s hardly any scope for migration left. On top of it all – now we face the charge of overgrazing. How is that even possible?”Rituja Mitra, who has for long worked on FRA in this area, supports the pastoralists’ claim. “If one looks into the grazing [or rather, browsing] patterns of camels, they tend to prune the plant species from the top, which actually helps in regeneration! The bets [islands] of the Marine National Park have always been a hotspot for the endangered Kharai camel, which feeds on mangroves and their associate species. The forest department believes otherwise. Some of the papers it has authored, and those by some academics too, claim there is enough evidence to prove that camel browsing leads to ‘overgrazing’. As the 2016 research paper points out, there are multiple reasons for the loss of mangrove cover. It connects that loss with the fallout of industrialisation and other factors. It does not anywhere blame the erosion of that cover on the maldharis and their camels. Those multiple factors are significant.

Jamnagar and surrounding areas have seen quite some industrialisation since the 1980s. “There is the effect of salt pan industries, oil jetties, and other industrialisation in these areas,” points out Rituja. “They face few difficulties in having land diverted for their use – for their ease of business! But the department becomes conservationist when it comes to the subsistence occupation of pastoralists. Which, incidentally, runs counter to Article 19(g) of the Constitution, which guarantees the right ‘to practise any profession, or to carry on any occupation, trade or business’.”Since pastoralist grazing is banned inside the marine park, camel herders often face harassment from the forest department. Aadam Jat is among those maldharis who have suffered. “A couple of years ago,” he says, “I was detained by forest officials for grazing camels here and paid a fine of Rs. 20,000.” Other pastoralists here, too, tell us of similar experiences. “The central government&#39;s legislation of 2006 is still of no help,” says Rituja Mitra. Under the Forest Rights Act 2006, Section 3(1)(d) provides community rights of uses and grazing (both settled or transhumant) and traditional seasonal resource access of nomadic or pastoralist communities. “Nonetheless, these maldharis are routinely penalised by forest guards for grazing, and often end up paying Rs. 20,000 to Rs. 60,000 when caught,” says Rituja, adding that the various safeguards set up on paper under the FRA remain non-functional. It somehow seems futile to try and expand mangrove cover without involving pastoralists who have lived here for generations and know this complex zone better than anyone else. “We understand this land, understand how the ecology works, and we are also not against the government policies they make to protect the species, the mangroves,” Jagabhai Rabari says. “All that we ask is: please hear us before making any policies. Or else the lives of around 1,200 people residing within this area will be at stake, and so too the lives of all those camels.”

The reporter would like to thank Mahendra Bhanani, former coordinator of Sahjeevan&#39;s camel programme, for his expertise and help during the reporting of this story. Ritayan Mukherjee reports on pastoral and nomadic communities through
 an independent travel grant from the Centre for Pastoralism. The Centre has not exercised any editorial control over the 
contents of this reportage.

Jamnagar’s ‘swimming camels’ in deep waters

جام نگر:’تیرنے والے اونٹوں‘ کی زندگی خطرے میں

जामनगरच्या ‘पोहणाऱ्या उंटांना’ अभयारण्याचं भय

जामनगर के ‘तइराक ऊंट’ बुड़े ला धरिन

ജാംനഗറിലെ നീന്തുന്ന ഒട്ടകങ്ങൾ പ്രതിസന്ധിയുടെ ആഴങ്ങളിൽ

ਜਾਮਨਗਰ ਦੇ 'ਤੈਰਾਕ ਊਠ' ਭੁੱਖ ਮਿਟਾਉਣ ਲਈ ਡੂੰਘੇ ਪਾਣੀ ਲੱਥਦੇ ਹੋਏ

కష్టాల కడలిలో జామ్‌నగర్ 'ఈత ఒంటెలు'

ଗଭୀର ଜଳରେ ଜାମନଗରର ‘ସନ୍ତରଣକାରୀ ଓଟ’

অকূল পাথারে খাবি খাচ্ছে কচ্ছের ‘সাঁতারু উটের’ দল

ஜாம்நகரின் ‘நீந்தும் ஒட்டகங்கள்’ ஆழத்தில் சிக்கியுள்ளன

অথাই সাগৰত জামনগৰৰ ‘সাতুৰিব জনা উট’

ದಟ್ಟ ಸುಳಿಯಲ್ಲಿ ಜಾಮ್‌ ನಗರದ ʼಈಜುವ ಒಂಟೆಗಳುʼ

अस्तित्व के संकट से जूझते जामनगर के ‘तैरने वाले ऊंट’

ઊંડા પાણીમાં ઉતારતાં  જામનગરના તરવૈયા, ઊંટો

Marine National Park (Gulf of Kachchh)

At present, we can only accept donations in Indian rupees by Indian citizens. All donations made to the CounterMedia Trust are eligible for exemption under Section 80G of the Income Tax Act, 1961. Here is a copy of our exemption certificate.


India is bigger than New Delhi. And people need to know more about the rest of this vast nation.


Younger, media-saturated generations are growing up knowing little about their country, but a lot about the elites of a few metros and towns. For a narrowly-owned, commercially-driven media, the dumbing down of a nation is part of standard operating procedure. The last available data of the Centre for Media Studies (CMS, Delhi) show us that reports from New Delhi account for 66 per cent of news on the front pages of major dailies. The CMS data also found that just about 0.24 per cent of front page news came out of rural India. The TV channels are not much better.PARI exists to change that.We are a non-profit organisation. We publish under creative commons, and do not charge readers a subscription fee or put-up advertisements. Nothing is behind a paywall and we are completely free-to-access by anyone. We guard our independence and receive no direct grants from governments and corporations, nor any funding that could dictate our content. So, we are dependent on volunteer labour, donations from individuals, foundations and institutions that see value in independent and free media.PARI is changing the way Indian journalism reports and documents the rural.India is more than the elite of a few metros and towns. We report on rural lives and livelihoods, languages, communities, migrants and more. We need your help to pull off this most ambitious of Indian journalistic endeavours. The scale of this effort costs money. Donate generously - and spread the word about PARI.&nbsp;

Donate FAQs


Let’s get you acquainted

Welcome to PARI

Want to republish this article? Please write to <a href="mailto:zahra@ruralindiaonline.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">zahra@ruralindiaonline.org</a> with a cc to <a href="mailto:namita@ruralindiaonline.org" target="_blank" rel="noopener noreferrer">namita@ruralindiaonline.org</a>

Jamnagar’s ‘swimming camels’ in deep waters

State policies’ dismissal of traditional knowledge of the pastoralist communities endangers the lives of Kharai camels and their herders in and around the Marine National Park and Sanctuary in Jamnagar, Gujarat

Related stories

A rain-scented walk in Sivagangai

Living on ravaged land

Biswas and the bamboos on his bike

Recycling energy, Godda style

Bhadels of Goa

Pookadai: still throbbing with morning life

Koli Kadlas

Malnourishment high among children of migrants: study

Wheels of the rural Indian West

Living Under a Red Cloud in Bellary

Vedla – earrings of the Maher community

Dreaming of water, drowning in debt

Kali: the dancer and his dreams

Farmer's diet worse than a convict's

In Yavatmal, life goes on

Suicides are about the living, not the dead

Death of a carpenter

Hoisa Shigmo!

Women farmers: weaving a life in Anantapur

Defiant in Dhinkia

Spice and all that's nice

Kerala's Green Army

The ‘jugaad’ not-a-mobile

Health as someone else's wealth

Calibrating in a Kudumbashree assembly unit