American naturalist, essayist, poet, philosopher and a leading transcendentalist in the world Henry David Thoreau once said that "Nothing makes the earth seem so spacious as to have friends at a distance; they make the latitudes and longitudes" - which redirects to the meaning that having friends across the world makes it seem vast. The birds are the peaceful representatives of this theory and carriers of that tranquil yet profound, limitless relationship around the world - as they fly in flocks together between places every now and then, and their world remains boundless. Unfortunately, not many people celebrate their existence these days but luckily, there is a man in the country who not only celebrates the heavenly existence of birds but also studies and writes about them, educating the rest of the world.

Bangla Academy, the country's oldest institution fostering Bengali literature and culture, has recently awarded seven prominent individuals for their noteworthy contributions in the literary and cultural fields this past Friday on December 24th, and renowned Ornithologist Enam Ul Haque received the Meher Kabir Biggyansahitya Purashkar this year. Celebrating his career, Dhaka Courier interviewed the eminent Ornithologist who is simultaneously playing his role as a traveller, wildlife photographer, conservator, writer, researcher, and educator.

Retired as a Wing Commander of Bangladesh Air Force in 1996, Enam Ul Haque has a successful corporate career. He has authored a number of books related to birds and wildlife, travelled to various parts of the world including the South and North Poles, as well as the Everest base camp. He formed the Bangladesh Bird Club (BBC) and the Bangla Mountaineering and Trekking Club (BMTC) as an ardent birdwatcher and trekker, and currently maintaining his role as the Chairman of WildTeam.

On winning the Meher Kabir Biggyansahitya Purashkar: 2021

"The Bangla Academy has been awarding the Meher Kabir Biggyansahitya Purashkar since 2005, in recognition of the overall contribution of popular writers in science literature. The bi-annual award is given by the family of our late eminent National Professor Kabir Chowdhury, and the award is named after his wife Meher Kabir. Six of the prominent, revered and influential scholars-writers-academicians have received this prestigious award before me, which made this award a bit more special. Renowned zoologist professor Kazi Jaker Hossain first received the award in 2005, and during his tenure as an academician in Dhaka University, courses such as the "Wildlife Biology" course and the Department of Zoology was initiated. He was a great author whom I deeply admire as a reader. The other five awardees are also motivated me through their varieties of works and publications, and I am profoundly honoured seeing my name besides these eminent and respected personalities."

The present situation of birds in Bangladesh

"Speaking of birds, here come two things. First of all, the number of birds in the country is increasing, as the number of their species is increasing, at least what it seems. The species that we did not know existed in Bangladesh before, are now known - however, they have been in Bangladesh forever, but they are so rare and hidden that we have not seen them earlier.

Now here comes the question - why they are visible now? Because in the last ten years, people's interest in birds has increased a lot, and many people now have cameras in their hands. In these 10 years, we've got at least 10,000 new people, and through them, we are getting a lot of new information on birds.

Unfortunately, this does not mean that the number of birds is increasing. This means that there were many birds in this region, and now we are getting this information. For example, I wrote an encyclopedia on birds in 2006. The number of birds there was 650, now it is 715. This does not mean that these 65 new species have been added - we just have received information about these birds now.

Another issue is the population of birds. The population of each bird is an important factor. For example, the crow is one of the species but crows have a large population in our country. Now when it comes to the bird population, there are two things to talk about. There are some common birds we see in the cities-towns-villages and eat human waste or leftovers. There are about 50 species of these birds - crows, hawks, kites, etc. The numbers of these species are increasing because their food is increasing as the population grows, and they do not have a habitat crisis compared to other birds. Looking at them, we may think that the overall number of birds is increasing - Sadly, that's not true. The population of other birds are not growing, and we have to think about those birds of more than 650 other species. The population of those birds are going down mostly because every year we are taking down more of their feeding and breeding places. We forget that the birds also need rooms for forage, feed and nest. Those birds are not doing well - and that's absolutely sure, we know it from the anecdotal. There are not too many available studies on every bird but only a few birds, and during our study, we found that the bird population of certain birds is falling and they are the majority.

The population of those 65 species are not doing very well. They are falling because of one reason - their places where they could breed or get their foods are reducing, as we are taking over all the wetlands, we are converting those wetlands into fish ponds, and we are not living many places for the birds to forage or nest. More than 650 species of birds are not increasing - rather many are decreasing.

The other 50-60 species that we see in our neighbourhoods, they are doing well. We do not have to worry right now about our Starling (Shalik), the Crows (Kaak), the Quails or the Cuckoos (Kokil) etc. These birds are doing very well, you can see them everywhere in Dhaka. The Bhubon Chil (Black Kite) and Shankhachil (Brahminy Kite), they are also doing fine."

What about the other species?

"Regarding the matter of why the other species of birds aren't doing well - that is because they live in remote places, namely the wetlands and forests, and we are all the times polluting, degrading and taking over those places by filling up the wetlands and we are also ruining most of our forests. That being said, we need to also focus on the brighter side as well. We have at least one very good bird land that is not ruined, we have kept it in very good condition - and the name of that place is Sundarbans."

On Sundarbans

"Over the last 50 years of Bangladesh, this is the least disturbed or, in fact, in many cases, we have improved. For example, the bandits - there used to be groups of bandits in Sundarbans, and now we don't have to worry about that. Bandits were killing the wildlife, a lot of Sundarbans was in their hands - and the whole scenario is changed now. Sundarbans is now much better looked after, and we have not ruined it like the other forests. All other forests including our hill forests, we have absolutely ruined at a very fast pace. About our other small forests like Lawachara or Rema-Kalenga, we are not doing very well with those places. More tourists are going and the protections might have been improved but those are degraded forests. Lots of damage has been done to those places. Although the condition improved in the last couple of years, those places are ruined in terms of saving bird population but we are really proud of our Sundarbans because it gives shelter to the largest number of the bird population and the number of species. We have more than 300 species in one forest, in one place. So we must preserve at least this one forest.

Bangladesh is a heavily populated country, so the circumstances are understandable. A lot of wild forests are ruined and whatever is left is up to get ruined, but we have successfully kept at least one forest in very good condition and we should continue to do so and we should feel very proud of our Sundarbans."

The current situation in Asia

"All over Asia, the overall bird population in the last twenty years has fallen 60%, and this terrible condition makes it the worst place on earth for bird population. Although the bird population is decreasing all over the world, the worst is happening in Asia as it has been going through the fastest economic progress. When you do economic progress, you damage the natural resources. If you want to make industries, you pollute the water, air and nature, you take over spaces, and all these things have been going on for the last twenty years at a very fast pace in Asia. All statistics show that the biggest damage to nature and birds are done in Asia.

Unfortunately, Bangladesh is the worst spot regarding the abovementioned circumstances in this continent. With this astonishing number of people, we cannot really be any better than any other Asian country - be it India, China or any other country. However, the positive thing is that our people are not too demanding. we have never heard people saying that we don't want Sundarbans, we want to cut Sundarbans and make salt tanks. Nobody has demanded that - no politicians, nor any public groups. Nobody demanded that Sundarbans should be destroyed and we should convert them into anything for our economy. An example could be Thailand - the country had its own mangrove forests like our Sundarbans, which got converted into Salt Tanks for economic profits. We haven't done that here and I am proud that no one demanded that here."

What should be the roles of the tourists?

"Regarding the tourists, we must do what the world is doing. We cannot say that we will keep our tourist attractions so pristine that nobody can enter. There is no such place on earth. We have to manage both, and luckily our tourist population in Sundarbans are less than the places in other countries; for example, even the small forests in India where I have seen the lines of tourists lining up the entire night. It's not that we cannot allow tourists; rather what we cannot allow is the conversion. We cannot convert those places, but we are converting anyway. Our Madhupur forest, we have converted it three times in the last fifty years. We have been converting our hill tracts every day, nobody talks about it and that is dangerous. If you cut the forest and make something else, that ruins everything. Tourists can never do the total damage, their contribution to the destruction is very small compared to the total conversion. We cannot convert the forests but we are doing that all the time, for example in Sylhet we have converted the forests to other plantations. We cannot convert the natural vegetation into artificial. If we keep our natural plants unharmed, we save the birds, as well our tigers and other wildlife animals. They are not to be meant for our converted gardens. So overall it can be said that the conversion process is the number one enemy.

In terms of the responsibility of the tourists - they can educate the other tourists about the conversion. I am a tourist myself, I want to explore and enjoy the beauty of nature and tourists must be allowed in places so that they can help educate people, can get the necessary studies done. I have travelled to many places in the world including countries like Myanmar and even Antarctica, and I stayed there as well as contributed to the study."

On the importance of balancing

"We need to have industries, we need to have roads, infrastructures and progress in the economy but at the same time, we must have the wilderness. A little bit of wilderness must be left. This is a great challenge for the government to make a balance between development and conservation, and I am glad that the situation is being handled well."

WildTeam

"As the WildTeam, we are trying to educate the people in the villages at Sundarbans, so that they can live well with the wildlife out there. They are living side-by-side with the tigers in Sundarbans so we need to educate them on how to live comfortably without harming the tigers or other animals, and vice-versa. Those are the little things we are doing from our WildTeam. we haven't made any earthshaking change, but we probably have educated a number of people there and we hope that many other organizations like ours will work in all our forests, not only in Sundarbans."

On the migratory birds

"Of those 700+ species of birds, 400 are the resident birds here. The other 300 species, live here half the year and leave Bangladesh mostly for breeding in the Northern Areas like Mongolia, Siberia etc. They live there as they cannot nest in Bangladesh; they go there-nest-and then come back again. We cannot call them the guest birds (Atithy Pakhi) - this is their land, they need half of their lifetimes to spend here. If a duck or goose lives 25 years, it spends 12-13 years of its life here in Bangladesh. They don't recognize two countries here, they see this as their place. This is also their land, Tibet or Siberia is also their land - and we must conserve all the other places in between where they stop. It is our duty to conserve our wetlands in Bangladesh, all these migratory birds are living here. This is their winter home, so we need to focus on saving these lands from pollutions and conversions. If we fail and pollute the water, we do damage not only to Bangladesh but the world because these birds belong to the whole world. We need to save the shorebirds by stopping the pollutions and conversions and we need to educate the people. If a man pollutes the water in Dinajpur, he is actually killing the birds in Hatiya. He might not know the connection, so it is necessary to educate everyone about saving our beautiful wildlife creatures for the greater good."