The Deepor Beel is a large and prominent floodplain lake located in the south-west of Guwahati city in Assam. It is a Wildlife Sanctuary of the Government of Assam and an important Ramsar site since 2002. Its basin is drained by a system of rivulets and hill streams that connect the neighbouring hills and the forests to the river Brahmaputra through an outlet called the Khanajan. In 2004, Birdlife International declared the wetland an important bird area
The name Deepor Beel means the ‘lake of elephants’–a Beel in Assamese and Bodo dialects is a lake, and the word Deep-or is said to have derived from the word for elephants in one of the indigenous dialects. Historically, Bodo, Karbi, Garo, Rabha and Khasi tribes, and Assamese-speaking, fishing and other communities lived around the place. The word Deep-or, therefore, might have originated from an admixture of these dialects. Different local stories abound for the history and the significance of the wetland. In one of the stories a visiting and thirsty Brahmin priest is said to have contributed to the forming of the lake through his magical powers. The long-established relationship of the lake to the elephants of the forests at its edge is more plausible. Despite urban interference and ecological apathy big groups of elephants continue to visit the wetland, especially in the winters when the scarce sources of water in the neighbouring hill forests dry up. The special relationship of elephants to this lake is made more prominent by the fact that its shape somewhat resembled an elephant’s footprint, although this shape is being increasingly modified and the relationship with the elephants is becoming increasingly fraught, due to land reclamations for urbanisation (Bodo 2017).
There are no historical epigraphs or manuscripts connected to the Deepor Beel, but this does not diminish its historical significance or disconnect the lake from history. Much of the history of Guwahati city is connected to the wetlands. For centuries, its marshy waters created a natural geographical barrier for the forts of Pandu and Guwahati, slowing down the invading armies and forcing mounted troops to take a narrow, perilous land passage to the two forts. Because of such geography, successive invading armies from Bengal and the Mughal centre were determinedly repelled from Guwahati each time. In summers, the waters of the Brahmaputra rise significantly and cover a larger land area that also encompasses the Deepor Beel. In the famous Battle of Saraighat, the Ahom armies strategically used the natural fortresses offered by the rise and fall of these waters and routed an invading naval and land army of the Mughals for the final time.
Tribal hamlets skirting the southern border of the Deepor Beel have their own oral histories of migrating and settling along the Beel. The settlements of Karbis, Khasis, Bodo and Rabha tribes were after a time followed by fishermen communities of non-tribal societies. The tribes, in fewer numbers, and the moriya (fishermen community) in greater numbers, constitute the major communities of people residing along the wetland today. There is a hill rivulet on the southern edge of the wetland, some distance off the Gorchuk-Airport road, which is said to be a variant of one of the ancient sites called the Jyotirlingas referred to in the Shiva Purana.
On most days, big mammals are seldom seen in Deepor Beel during the day except sometimes in the early hours of the morning. A variety of bird species remains throughout the year, flying in and out of the wetland. The swamps are a stop for migratory birds which travel in during the winters. The presence of these birds varies in different years and ornithologists have complained that increasing pollution and urban interferences are hampering the patterns of migration. Amongst the migratory birds that travel to the Beel are the barn swallow, northern shoveler, brown shrike, ruddy shelduck (the brahminy duck), common sandpiper, brown-headed gull, common/ stejneger’s stonechat, red-crested pochard, tufted duck, northern lapwing, common snipe, temminck’s stint, whiskered tern, white wagtail, citrine wagtail, little ringed plover, grey-headed lapwing and grey-backed shrike. Most of these birds have not been spotted in the wetland since the winter of 2010.
The Siberian crane, the long-distance migrant from western and central Russia also travelled to the Deepor Beel.On a usual day’s visit to the Deepor Beel one is more likely to see Herons, including the cattle egrets and lapwings and storks. Efforts for conservation of the wetland have not adequately helped either the residents or the migratory birds. The greater adjutant storks, for example, still flock together in the wetland in abundance, but as the municipal garbage dump has been situated in the centre of the Beel, it has fed the birds hazardous waste, including plastic materials.
Himanjyoti Kalita,
MA 1st Semester,
DCJGU
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