Journalism of Courage
75-year-old Ashok Purandare has a unique hobby raising and training 150 pigeons for annual races
Seventy-five-year-old Ashok Purandare,who resides at Kapila Society,Gokhale Nagar,has a unique way of keeping busy in the afternoons. He whiles the hours away with the 150-odd pigeons he has as pets on the roof-top of his house! From the Royal Indian Navy Bloodline pigeons to the Carriers and the Madras Club pigeons got from Orissa,Chennai and England,Purandare has been a proud owner for 60 years now. Something which started as a reason for escaping school has now become a full-time hobby for me. As a child too,I was very interested in keeping pigeons and connecting with them, says Purandare who was a senior vet officer at the Institute of Veterinary Biological Products,Aundh.
The Pigeon Club of Pune organises races between November and March. During this period,pigeons from the entire region of Pune and Mumbai are set free to race. The time it takes to cover the distance is measured and then compared to the flight time of the other pigeons. The owner of the fastest pigeon is rewarded.
The training for the races continues throughout the year with only a month of rest in the monsoons. Purandare is currently training the young ones for the upcoming race. “A piece of cloth is attached to a long stick and waved gently to signal their flight. In the course of such a single flight,the young pigeons can fly to a distance of eight kilometers and more. Their flight ends when the stick is waved by the owner several times to signal their landing. They are often lured back when grains are strewn over the rooftop along with a bar of salt,” he describes. Wild and sick pigeons flock along with Purandare’s birds for food but he avoids such breeding as they carry germs.
The terrace of the Purandare residence has four large,wired enclosures with separate compartments for the males,females,injured,’pension wallahs’ and the young ones. There is a different ‘maternity hospital’ for the birds to breed in winter. “Summers and the monsoons make the breeding birds more susceptible to illnesses. The moulting birds are rarely set to fly as they are in a process of growing feathers.
The pigeons are my military boys, says Purandare,who treats the birds as his children. They are subjected to a disciplined military training which prevents any liaison with female birds. “When attracted to them,the faujis refuse to fly. They keep chasing the girls!” he chuckles.
