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The Rann of Kutch
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The
Rann of Kutch, an area of 18,000 sq km, lies almost entirely within
Gujarat along the border with Pakistan. The Little Rann of Kutch
extends northeast from the Gulf of Kutch over 5,100 sq km. Once an
extension of the Arabian Sea, the Rann ("salt marsh") has been closed off
by centuries of silting. During Alexander's time it was a navigable lake,
but is now an extensive mudflat, inundated during the monsoons, salty and
cracked otherwise. Settlement is limited to low, isolated hills.♣
When I visited the Rann in April, 2006, the
highs were already soaring past 110 F. The best way to see it, as I did,
is in a 4WD stocked with lots of water. Dotting the parched landscape are
desolate desert-like encampments, where a family or two combine forces to
eke out a living by mining salt from the saline ground water, the biggest
local industry. Legend has it that when a salt worker dies and is
cremated, the soles of his feet survive - a lifetime of salt pan labor bakes them so hard
that even fire cannot fully burn them.♣
Tata lorries transport their salt to small trading villages along a
railway line. In the dry season, such villages host veritable hillocks of
salt as far as the eye can see, where it's packed and sent out on trains. |
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Kutch is also home
to numerous
tribal groups,
whose
attire often
adds a dash of color
to the otherwise
dull desert
monotones. Many,
such as
the Rabari, are
still nomadic or
semi-nomadic
pastoralists (these
photos only show
women, children, and
older men with the
camels; the younger
men were out tending
their sheep and
would converge in
the evening at a
designated place,
where the women
would setup the
tents and cook).
In the monsoon
season, parts of the
Rann fill up with
seasonal brackish
water and some
locals harvest
shrimp in it. They
abandon their boats
afterwards in the
barren salty
mudflats, creating a
rather surreal
scene for the
spring/summer-time
visitor. Heat
mirages abound,
making distant
objects
hover strangely
above the land. The
Little Rann is also
a wildlife sanctuary
that protects the
Asiatic wild ass,
a shy and handsome
animal that can
sprint at 70 km/h.
Reduced to about
2,800 in number,
they depend on the
few grassy islands,
or bets,
nourished by monsoon
rains. The sanctuary
also contains a
large number of
local and migratory
birds, especially
flamingos, at its
many wetlands. A
memorable experience
was to go wading
knee-deep into the
warm waters of a
salt marsh with
thousands of
flamingos around.
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