Bird boy

At 22, Mehran Zaidi has written an authoritative book on Indian birds, and can rattle off figures that are perched on his fingertips

By Mukesh Khosla

When he was a young boy, Mehran Zaidi was unlike any other teenager living in his neighbourhood. While the boys picked up their bat and ball for a game of cricket, he would pick up his binocular and head for a nearby park with his uncle, a doctor. There, they would spend the entire day watching birds. It’s not a hobby most ordinary boys would gladly confess to, but Mehran was no ordinary boy.

After almost a decade since he started, Mehran, now 22, is one of India’s most knowledgeable young men on the avian species. His book, Bird by Bird, is an authoritative anthology, not just of rare birds or those that are going extinct, but of the common Indian birds that one spots around the house and in parks.

All of 22 years, Mehran is virtually a walking encyclopaedia on Indian birds. He can rattle off figures that are perched on his fingertips. He tells you there are 1,285 species of birds in India, of which some, such as the Mynah, are specific only to this region. Some of the rarest birds found in India include the Forest Owlet, which was thought to have been extinct until it was spotted recently after more than 75 years. Then, there is the Great Indian Bustard, found in Gujarat and Andhra Pradesh, and which is vanishing fast, victim to the hunting depredations of humans. The largest Indian flying bird is the crane, measuring over five feet in length; the smallest bird is Tickell's Flowerpecker, no bigger than the human thumb.

Mehran credits his uncle for his interest in birds. The visits to the park with him were “the starting point. Later, I began going alone or with my younger brother and my parents. They too have become birdwatchers like me,” he says.

Even his teachers at Delhi’s Mount St Mary’s and Delhi Public School were supportive of his unusual hobby; he ended up bagging several prizes in nature quizzes. Now in college, he has a dedicated fan following. Bird By Bird, with a foreword by Ruskin Bond, has had some excellent reviews. “Mehran’s enthusiasm is infectious,” writes Bond. “After writing this brief foreword, I shall take a long walk down to the nearest mountain stream, to do a little bird-watching of my own.” Among Mehran’s other admirers are Khushwant Singh and ornithologists Bikram Grewal and Ranjit Lal, who have congratulated him for his meticulous documentation of common Indian birds. In fact, Lal had read the manuscript and offered valuable suggestions before the book went in for printing. In one of his widely read columns, Khushwant Singh wrote, “It is heartening to see a college student spending his spare time watching birds and persuading his friends to take up bird-watching as a hobby. An outstanding example is Mehran Zaidi, who is yet to do his graduation from the Delhi University.”

When talk of Indian birds comes up, the first name that springs to mind is that of renowned ornithologist Dr Salim Ali. His Book of Indian Birds is the last word on the winged creatures. “He is the father of Indian ornithology, I am a mere student,” says Mehran. “In fact, his book has been my constant inspiration, and I consider it the bible of birds and bird-watching.”

Mehran is a member of the Delhi Bird Watching Group, and his favourite haunts are the Asola Bhatti Wildlife Sanctuary and the Aravali National Park. He also makes annual trips to the Harike Sanctuary near Amritsar and to the Bharatpur Sanctuary near Agra, which he considers the world’s best. Another favourite is the Pulicat Sanctuary, 60 km from Chennai: it is a feeding ground for nearly 80,000 water birds belonging to 37 species that migrate there every winter. Mehran visits these sanctuaries to see big birds like cranes, storks and falcons. “These big birds look very majestic when they fly,” he says. “I even find eagles and kites a very awe-inspiring sight.”

The young author says that birds have a language of their own, although no one has been able to decipher it. But what ornithologists have deciphered is that birds have various gradations of intelligence. For example, says Mehran, the Koel is a very intelligent bird. It lays its eggs in the nest of a crow. The Bulbul, too, is an intelligent and cheerful. The other birds that have sharp brains are eagles and kites. The pea-brained ones are pigeons and doves. “Birds have continued to captivate the world's imagination. Man has always tried to emulate them by trying to fly. Comic strip heroes like Superman and Spiderman have been created to fulfil man's fantasy to conquer the sky,” says Mehran, who is in the middle of another book, not just on birds but on butterflies as well.

With Inputs by Nag Mani