The Birdman of India
Salim Moizuddin Abdul Ali, popularly known as Dr. Salim Ali was an Indian naturalist. He is also referred to as the ‘Birdman of India’ by many. He was born born into a Sulaimani Bohra family in Bombay (Mumbai) on 12 November 1896. Salim Ali was the first Indian scientist to carry out a methodical bird survey throughout his country. He authored several books on birds, which popularized ornithology in India. After 1947 he became a key person behind the Bombay Natural History Society. Salim Ali also utilized his personal influence to derive support from the Government for his organization, establishment of the Bharatpur bird sanctuary, and for preventing destruction of a mega ecosystem, presently known as the Silent Valley National Park.
Salim Ali, along with American ornithologist Sidney Dillon Ripley wrote and published the landmark ten volume Handbook of the Birds of India and Pakistan in series. He was awarded the Padma Bhushan in 1958 and the Padma Vibhushan in 1976 by the Government of India, being third and second highest civilian honours respectively. Salim Ali's fruit bat, Salim Ali's dwarf gecko, several species of birds a couple of bird sanctuaries and institutions have also been named after him in recognition of his works.
Salim Ali lost his father Moizuddin Abdul Ali when he was a year old and his mother Zeenat-un-nissa when he was three. In spite of such debacles Ali did not have to face poverty because he was born in a well to do family of that time. He was brought up along with his siblings, by his maternal uncle, Amiruddin Tyabji, and childless aunt, Hamida Begum, in Mumbai. During his childhood Ali was very much fond of reading books on hunting in India. He would visit the Bombay Natural History Society with his uncle Amiruddin for bird watching, whom Ali considered a real hero. On growing up a further, he became highly interested in shooting sports, duly encouraged by his uncle.
In course oof time, for imparting proper education Ali was admitted to the primary section at Zenana Bible and and later to Medical Mission Girls High School at Girgaum, Bombay. When he was around the age of 13, Ali started suffering from a chronic headache that made him absence from class frequently. Because of that problem he was taken to Sind (now in Pakistan) to stay with his another uncle, who had suggested that the dry air at that place would improve Ali’s condition. But because of such breaks form studies his progress was hampered and he barely managed to pass his matriculation exam in 1913.
After schooling, Salim Ali's early higher education started at St. Xavier's College, Mumbai. Owing to some difficulty in the first year in college, he his left studies and went to Tavoy, Burma (Myanmar) to join the family's tungsten mining and timber business. Dense forests around that locality gave him an opportunity to devolop his naturalist and hunting skill there. At his new place, Ali also came in contact with J C Hopwood and Berthold Ribbentrop, the Forest Service officers in Burma. However as his family business in Burma did not sustain, Ali had to came back to India in 1917. Back at home he made up his mind to resume formal education again. So, Ali got admission in Davar's College of Commerce in Bombay for studing coomercial law and accountancy. But his field of actual interest was noticed by Father Ethelbert Blatter at St. Xavier's College, who persuaded Ali to study zoology. It is interesting to to note that Ali, after attending morning classes at Davar's College, also started attending zoology classes at St. Xavier's College at day time. He was able to complete the course in zoology in 1918 and married Tehmina, a distant relative within a short period.
Even after being graduate in zoology, having skill in observation and identification of birds, it became very difficult for Ali to find a suitable job for him for a couple of years. He failed to get the job of an ornithologist which was open at the Zoological Survey of India, due to the lack of a specified formal university degree. Subsequently he was hired as guide lecturer in 1926 at the newly opened natural history section in the Prince of Wales Museum in Mumbai. However did not get any job satisfaction, and after two years, in 1928 he took a study leave and move to Germany. He worked there under Professor Erwin Stresemann at the Berlin's Natural History Museum. As part of his duties Ali studied in the museum the specimens collected by J. K. Stanford in Burma. Inspite of oppositions from some corners Reginald Spence and Prater at BNHM encouraged Ali to conduct the studies at Berlin with the supervision of Stresemann. It was a great opportunity for Ali, who found Stresemann warm and helpful right from his first letter sent before even before seeing him in person. Ali used to call Professor Erwin Stresemann his guru, from whom he could learn a lot about nature and birds. In Berlin, Ali came in contact with many eminent German ornithologists of the time including Bernhard Rensch, Oskar Heinroth, Rudolf Drost and Ernst Mayr. He also got opportunity for meeting other important Indians in Berlin working in different fields, including the revolutionary Chempakaraman Pillai. He also gained experience in bird ringing at the Heligoland Bird Observatory. Ali returned to India from Germany in the year 1930 after considerably augmenting his knowledge on nature and birds.
On his return to India in 1930, he discovered that the guide lecturer position had been eliminated due to lack of fund. Despite the training at the prestigious University abroad, Salim Ali was unsuccessful in procuring a job in India. It was then that he hit upon an idea. There were vast areas in India, the princely states in particular, where avifauna was explored or studied to a negligible extent. He expressed his interest to conduct regional ornithological surveys in those areas for the Bombay Natural History Society. He would render his services free of cost, provided the Society and the respective state authorities would bear the expenses for his camping and transport. The princely states showed enough eagerness to have their birds recorded for future and readily accepted his novel idea. Then onwards Ali began his nomadic life with is his assignment – a new challenge before him. During next two decades he roamed about the different remote and distant places in the subcontinent studying birds.
Ridden about his task, he conducted systematic bird surveys in the princely states of Hyderabad, Cochin, Travancore, Gwalior, Indore and Bhopal with the patronage of their rulers. He got help and support in those surveys by Hugh Whistler who had previously surveyed many parts of India and kept important notes of his observations.
During survey Ali put to practice whatever he had learned in Berlin about the field of ornithology. The working conditions in most of the remote localities were tough and difficult to withstand by an average young man from a city. But the passion of Salim Ali for nature and birds helped him endure the unfavourable working/living conditions in his camp, rather he treated that part of his life as the best years of his career. The long years that Ali spent in surveying and studying birds made him one of the very few Indians who travelled major parts of the country to fulfill his mission, irrespective of the fact, whether that was remote or inaccessible.
In the beginning, Ali used to be accompanied by his wife Tehmina, who helped him on the job to a great extent. But she lost her life just after a minor surgery in 1939 and such a major loss shattered the life of Ali. After death of his wife and in the course of his later travels, Ali rediscovered the population of the bird Finn's baya (weaver bird) at Kumaon Terai, but he was unable to find the mountain quail in the Himalayas, the status of which continues to remain unknown. Ali did not show much interest in the details of bird systematics and taxonomy, rather he was much eager in studying birds in the field.
Finn's Baya
Later on Salim Ali also developed interest in bird photography in company with his friend Loke Wan Tho of Singapore. Loke was introduced to Ali by J. T. M. Gibson, a member of the BNHS and Lieutenant Commander of the Royal Indian Navy. Being a wealthy Singapore businessman, with keen interest in birds, Loke helped Ali and the BNHS with considerable financial support. Ali showed further interest in the historical aspects of ornithology in India as well. In Sunder Lal Hora memorial lecture in 1971 and Azad Memorial Lecture in 1978 he emphasized the need of the historical aspect and importance of bird study in India.
Other Contributions
By the time India got independence, Salim Ali became very popular at the same time influential. He tried his level best to ensure the survival of the BNHS, and managed to save the century old establishment by urging to the erstwhile Prime Minister Pandit Nehru for reasonable financial support.
Deriving influence from Ali, one of his cousin, Humayun Abdulali became an ornithologist and his niece Laeeq also took ample interest in birds and was married to Zafar Futehally - who subsequently became the honorary Secretary of the BNHS. Futehally played a major role in improving the study of birds in the country by forming a network of birdwatchers in India. Ali also guided several MSc and PhD students, the first of them was Vijaykumar Ambedkar.
Ali supported the development of ornithology in India by identifying prospective corners from where funding might be available. He helped establish an economic ornithology unit in the Indian Council for Agricultural Research in the mid-1960s. He could also obtain fund for migration studies through a project for the Kyasanur forest disease. I was a viral disease borne of arthropods having similarities with a Siberian tick-borne disease. This project was partly funded by the PL 480 grants of the USA, that became a political issue with allegations of CIA involvement. An Indian reporter of science wrote in a local newspaper that the venture was secretly using migratory birds for spreading deadly viruses and microbes into enemy territories. After independence India became a non-aligned country and the news resulted in political turmoil. Finally a committee was formed to examine the project and allegation raised. However the project was ultimately cleared of the allegation and as a precautionary measure the authority stopped routing the funds through Bangkok. Thereafter India started receiving fund for the project directly from USA to avoid avoid further suspicions.
Ali rendered yeoman’s service in conservation related issues in free India with support from the Prime Ministers Jawaharlal Nehru and Indira Gandhi. Being a keen birdwatcher herself, Indira Gandhi was greatly influenced by Ali's books on birds.
Ali was fond of riding motorbikes from his early life. In 1950, when he got an invitation from International Ornithological Congress at Uppsala, Sweden he shipped his favourite bike Sunbeam aboard the ‘SS Stratheden’ alongwith him from Bombay too. He traveled around Europe on his motorbike, and got minor injury due to a mishap in France. He also had several falls while traveling in Germany on the roads made of cobble. When he arrived at Uppsala just on time, on a fully loaded bike for the first session of the congress, the people started whispering that he might have ridden all the way from India.
Towards the close of his life, Salim Ali started documenting the lives of the people who had major contributions to the Bombay Natural History Society - but he unable complete the series because of his deteriorating health.
Published Works
Salim Ali wrote numerous articles, published mainly in the Journal of the Bombay Natural History Society. He credited his wife Tehmina a lot, who received education in England, for helping him improve his English writing skill. One of his popular article ‘Stopping by the woods on a Sunday morning’ written in 1930 was reprinted in The Indian Express on his birthday in 1984. Besides, Ali also authored a number of popular and academic books. His most popular work was ‘The Book of Indian Birds’, presented in the line of Whistler's ‘Popular Handbook of Birds’.
However his most important piece of work was the 10 volume ‘Handbook of the Birds of India and Pakistan’ written with Dillon Ripley. That work began in 1964 and ended in 1974 with a second edition completed after by others after his death, notably J. S. Serrao of the BNHS, Bruce Beehler, Michel Desfayes and Pamela Rasmussen. Ali also composed a number of regional field guides, including ‘The Birds of Kerala’, ‘The Birds of Sikkim’, ‘The Birds of Kutch’, ‘Indian Hill Birds’ and ‘Birds of the Eastern Himalayas’. Ali’s Several low-cost books written with his niece Laeeq Futehally were produced by the National Book Trust which was reprinted in several editions with translations into different languages of the country. In 1985 he wrote his autobiography ‘The Fall of a Sparrow’.
One of his last students, Tara Gandhi made a compilation of his short letters and writings in two volumes, which were published in 2006.
Dr. Salim Ali, though got his recognition late, but he was the recipient of numerous awards andseveral honorary doctorates. His first formal award was the ‘Joy Gobinda Law Gold Medal’ in 1953, given by the Asiatic Society of Bengal on the basis of an assessment of his work by Sunder Lal Hora. He received honorary doctorates from the Aligarh Muslim University in 1958, Delhi University in 1973 and Andhra University in 1978 respectively. He became the first non-British citizen to receive the Gold Medal of the British Ornithologists' Union in 1967. Ali further received the J. Paul Getty Wildlife Conservation Prize consisting of a sum of $100,000 in the same year. He used the amount as a corpus for the Salim Ali Nature Conservation Fund. The story did not end there, as he received a number of medals and prizes through out his life in India and abroad. The Government of Indian also honoured him with the Padma Bhushan in 1958 and the Padma Vibhushan in 1976. He was nominated a Member of Parliament to the Rajya Sabha in 1985.
At the age of 90 years Dr. Salim Ali died of prostate cancer in Bombay, on 20 June 1987. The life of Dr. Ali was not a smooth sailing, and since the death of his parents he had to pass through different types of hurdles before reaching to the most celebrated position as a biologist in general and ornithologist in particular. Actually the hurdles were also the challenges before him – he did embrace and overcome.
After his death the Government of India in 1990 established the Sálim Ali Centre for Ornithology and Natural History (SACON) at Coimbatore. The Pondicherry University too established the Salim Ali School of Ecology and Environmental Sciences. The area of the BNHS headquarters in Mumbai was renamed as ‘Dr Salim Ali Chowk’. In commemoration of his 100th birth Anniversary, Postal Department of the Government of India released a set of two postal stamps as a mark of deep regard to this great scientist of the country.
NB: Images have been collected from internet.
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