Mid-day in a forest

A lonesome small nullah,  with cool, dark shadows of the brooding trees taking a midday siesta in the afternoon of a small section of the paradise of nature. It was 1964. Time stopped when I also took lunch and then rest under the shade of another tree at the edge of the pool of water. This was a section of a Protected Forest of Haridwar Forest Division, and a corridor for the movement of elephants and other wild animals from Chilla range in Rajaji National Park to the Ganges that flowed below the old ruins of the Gurukul Kangri University Building, near the village of Kangri, 9 km from Haridwar on Najibabad road.   We have lost this nullah and many others of this kind, because of the axe of the woodcutters from Haridwar, and a road that cut across such nullahs so that our vehicles can move fast over the wild landscape. Such sites in this region have been lost permanently. Our future generations will miss them. They will never know what even non- Reserved Forests used to look like! They may be told only of the problems of wildlife conservation. Local people now complain about the crops raided by elephants who find nothing to satisfy their hunger with - the forest having become a virtual desert for them. The photograph brings back the nostalgic moments spent by me during my first ever visit to a real forest.