This is a real story of a brave woman named Mrs Jyostna Shi who
saved her husband from the mouth of a tiger taking the risk of her
own life. The family lives at Gurguria Bhubaneswari village of Sundarbans of
West Bengal which is famous for Royal
Bengal tiger. Also wildlife thrives in this unique ecosystem and it is home to
large numbers of mammals, birds, fish etc. The area is covered with many creeks
as it is part of the Ganges Delta. The delta is densely covered by mangrove
forests. In this area many people eke out their livelihoods by catching fishes
and crabs, in addition to collecting honey. Also many survive on small scale
farming so the economic condition of the people is not very good. Many
people were killed by the tigers because the animals suddenly attacked the
people who were catching the fish or doing farming or collecting honey.
According to a news report at least 23 villagers were killed by tigers in
the Sundarbans in one year (telegraphindia.com/west-bengal/dt 02.06.21). On 3 April 2021, early morning Mrs
Jyostna Shi along with her husband (both middle aged persons) went to catch fishes and crabs by moving
their small boat. It is pertinent to mention that because of tigers, the
fishermen and women move through their small boat in the creek. After going a
few minutes through the creek, husband and wife tied their boat in a small
tree and started moving on foot to observe waterways. After moving for a
few minutes they decided to return. When they were returning,
the wife was a few steps ahead, and the husband suddenly cried tiger, tiger.
Mrs Jyostna Shi saw the tiger had grabbed her husband with its legs. She jumped
on the back of the tiger. But the tiger wanted to kill her husband and eat. She
started to remove the tiger from the husband but Tiger was not leaving him so
she finally put her two fingers in two canals of the ears of the tiger.
The tiger was nervous as ears’ canals are very sensitive to all animals
including human beings. The tiger left the man but by this time the man was
profusely bleeding. She then with a lot of struggle took her husband in the
boat. And after reaching the village she cried to help her husband as
husband was profusely bleeding because badly injured. The villagers were kind
enough and arranged a vehicle to take them to Kolkata which is around 140
kilometres away from the area. In Kolkata, the orthopedic surgeon did few
operations and still the person is under treatment and he cannot lift his one
hand. Shi family has two daughters and they arranged the marriage of the elder
daughter, but unfortunately the first daughter's husband was killed by the
tiger. For this incident, the in-laws asked her to go back to her parents’ home
and by this time she delivered a girl child also, so the young helpless woman came
with the baby girl child to the parents' home. It is reported that for survival
of all the family members Mrs Shi (wife of injured husband) works in the
village and hardly earns Rs 200 per day. If she earns, family members get food
but if not then eating is uncertain. Anyway, I salute the woman for
fighting with the tiger at the cost of her life to save her husband.
(The
basic inputs of the article have been collected from Didi No.1, a Bengali TV
show, dated 27 September 2021)
Dr (Prof ) Shankar Chatterjee, Hyderabad, Dt. 29 September 2021.
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