Collage of pebbles

In December 2017, following an obscure reference, I instinctively ordered "The Search for the Pink-Headed Duck", a 1991 title by relatively unknown American birder Rory Nugent, at Amazon. They took a while to import and deliver the paperback with not so impressive cover. While the book has quite a few wrong details, and enjoys a political view not entirely aligned with my nationalist belief system, I found it to be a fascinating tale. It is a quest in the trail of Pink-Headed Duck, now practically extinct, which used to frequent at the Gangetic plains, and riverine swamps of Myanmar. In couple of months’ time, we were at road, in the quest of another duck. A duck, that was rapidly following the footsteps of Pink-headed Duck. *** The road was well maintained but darkness of foothill evening ensued. To magnify the effect, dense vegetation started to surround us. We were lost. We left Tezpur at least 30 min back. Balipara was crossed. The car was kept on Bhalukpon

Prologue Without any conscious reason, our book hunting in Calcutta Book Fair 2016 was different. Somehow we bypassed our favourite literature stalls, well, mostly. The focus shifted to travel and anthropology. Perhaps our Sikkim trip in January, with its raw and fresh memories, played a role. We picked up "The Tribes of West Bengal" by Dhirendra Nath Baskey, which gives a nice introduction to primary tribes of our state with a focus to Austric tribes. We found Chumki Piplai's title, which allows us to take a peek at one of the most primitive tribes of our country - Jarwa. We bought Narayan Sanyal's "Dandak Shabari" that introduces us to the Austric tribes like Maria, Muria, Shabar, and Gond in Central India. But the most valuable surprise came at the stall of The Asiatic Society, where we discovered "Kirata Jana Kṛti" by Suniti Kumar Chatterji. While we knew Chatterji, the linguist; we were not aware of his anthropologist avatar. In thi