CITY JOURNAL (Thrissur, India) 03 July 11 Snake catching his hobby! (Vishnu Prasad)
Ever marvelled at how effortlessly people on various television science channels tame dangerous reptiles?
Well, a real life adventurer has been doing the same in Thrissur for the past 25 years.
Xavier Antony Kunjappu from Elthuruthu is the man many run after when they have a stray snake in their yards. But for him, it is nothing more than a case of refusing to let go off a childhood hobby.
"It started when I was a kid. I liked to catch snakes. Pretty soon, people were asking me to come and help whenever one was found nearby," said Xavier.
It is not just snakes that Xavier likes to go after. He has been known to assist doctors tackle a rogue elephant or a stray leopard.
"I was bitten once by leopard in Chelakkara when I went to shoot him with a tranquiliser gun," Xavier said.
But it is snakes that he has to tackle more often than not. The nine King Cobras he has caught are a testimony to this.
"Snake cases are increasing by the day because lots of construction works are going on in lands that were previously undisturbed," he said.
Catches them, he does, but killing is something that is forbidden in Xavier's book.
"We have no right to kill them. I usually catch them and donate them to a zoo in case of the more poisonous varieties or let them free in the wild," he said.
Xavier also found a curious anomaly that he had been noticing of late.
"Earlier, there used to be healthy mix of poisonous and non-poisonous varieties. But now most cases are of poisonous snakes. This is due to people panicking at the sight of every snake and killing it on the spot," he said.
And Xavier does his bit to undo the damage.
When he is not on his high-risk job of catching dangerous wild animals or running the printing press that he owns, he is taking awareness classes on the environment and how we are damaging it.
"There are poisonous snakes, but none as poisonous as humans," he said adding that humans are to blame for most of the damage done to the environment.
Snake catching his hobby!