Hyderabad: A group of travel and wildlife enthusiasts, mostly from the city, will be starting on a very special journey in the last week of May.
Uday Krishna, Srinivas Kolli, Mani Chandrika Chalasani, Joseph Thomas, Medha Thomas, and Sujal Patwardhan from Mumbai, who call themselves Indian Rollers, will be travelling 20,000 km in over 65 days along the picturesque old silk route — across countries like Burma, China, Russia, Uzbekistan, Poland, Germany, France and Morocco, to spread the message of saving tigers and protecting the tiger corridors in these countries.
Uday, who is the founder of the NGO Vata Foundation, an organisation in the city working towards tiger conservation, says the idea of this trip came about when the group did a 3,500 km road-trip across the Himalayas last year.
He says, “It was a transformational journey and we thought of planning another expedition with a cause. We want to reach out to the local community, especially the Indian community, in the areas we are travelling through. We want to raise enough funds which could help us arrange for drone surveillance in the forest areas — to keep track of the tigers and also curb poaching.”
The state tourism department is partially sponsoring the cost of the trip, which is around Rs 1 crore for the six-member team. Uday says that recently the length of the trip was increased by 2,000 km as the initial route, through Nepal and Tibet, had to be avoided because of the recent earthquakes. They have also bought two second-hand Toyota Land Cruisers for the trip.
“But there could be security hazards in countries like Burma, Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Russia, where we plan to keep driving for most of the time. For the border crossings too, we have small time windows and delays could lead to a lot of other issues.
“As a vegetarian, I might be having problems with food in China; so we will also be carrying ready-to-eat supplies,” he says.
Depending on the amount the team is able to raise, they plan to conduct a trip every two years to travel and raise awareness about increasing forest cover and protecting tigers.
Joseph, who works as an HR manager, adds, “Participating in the Himalayan expedition last year was a good practice run for us to understand how to deal with altitude sickness, driving techniques and tolerance levels for both man and machine in harsh conditions. And since all six members have gone through this before, it gives us a much better sense of preparedness for the grueling journey.”
