Srikant Rao is a friend of snakes. Observing the fact that even educated people are afraid of snakes and consider all snakes dangerous, he is spreading awareness that not all types of snakes are venomous. Rao is working towards making people aware of rescuing snakes. He spoke to Kiddistan recently. Why is it important to catch snakes and rescue them? Generally public get scared on seeing snakes and prefer to kill them. Snakes are a part of nature and a very important part of the food chain. Snakes come when there are rats and frogs around. Don’t panic on seeing snakes as most of them are not harmful. There are 270 types of snakes in India and only four out of them are poisonous. In Hyderabad, only one type of venomous snake, cobra, can be found. So chances of a snake harming you are almost negligible. How are snakes caught or rescued? The process to catch snake is quite simple and requires only a stick and your hands. If one finds a snake, give a call to snake friends. There are NGOs like Snake Cell, Friends of Snakes in the city that work for the cause. They will come and rescue the snake. One has to leave a snake jungle or open space, because that is where it will survive. What we do is first identify if the snake is a poisonous type. Later, depending on aggressiveness of a snake, we decide with what approach we should catch him. How did you begin to work towards snake rescuing? I have been catching snakes since childhood. But at that time I was not aware of the importance of snakes in the ecosystem.. I used to do it because I like it. Then I came into contact with Friends of Snakes where I got basic training of how to rescue snakes and their importance in our environment. Since then I have been organising camps or programmes to create awareness among people about snakes. How many snakes have you caught? I have rescued a number of snakes. I also have organised more than 30 programmes informing more than 500 people. I do get calls from colleges, schools and other organisations for holding such camps. Source: The Hans India
