Hyderabad: Punjagutta once had Singhara talaab, a lake that is non-existent today, thanks to concretisation, an ecologist noted.
Water chestnut, an aquatic vegetable, is one among the several Common Property Resources (CPR) of Hyderabad that are depleting at a rate faster than one would expect.
For the uninitiated, CPRs are a community’s natural resource, where 'every member has the right of access and usage with specified obligations, without anybody having property rights over them' and they serve as food for birds, animals, which include minor forest products like fruits, nuts, fibre and medicinal plants.
"Several changes have been observed in the city’s CPR, including the decline of tamarind, wine grapes, anab-e-shahi grapes, phalsa fruit, and local mulberries, among others," informed Rajashekar Tummala, a consulting ecologist for ecological studies and biodiversity conservation. He added that tamarind is being imported from Vietnam and other countries.
Mathen Rajeev Mathew, Telangana State Board for Wildlife member and wildlife consultant Rajeev Mathen Mathew, seconded Rajshekar and named custard apple, Indian gooseberry, ber (Indian jujube), amla, gangool (burnt palm shoots), kweet (baelphal) and munjalu (ice-apples) as some other CPRs that are slowly disappearing.
"These were all collected in the peripheries of jungles and broken country, hilly outcrops hundreds of years ago. We remember that they were sold in front of schools like they were candies," he said, adding that all these have served as food for several birds, field rats and mice, monkeys and squirrels.
Ecologists and enthusiasts have lamented that trading the loss of several of these CPRs for infrastructural development was never worth it. "And once they are cut down, we're planting ornamental trees in their place, which are of no relevance to the area and life there," Rajeev said, and added that the time to conserve them is now. This can happen only when there is proper awareness about it.
