SUBHADRA CHERUKURI, SNAKE RESCUER

To all those who believe that women are afraid of snakes – I present to you, Subhadra Cherukuri who has broken this long standing gender stereotype to be one of (north) Bangalore’s few woman snake rescuers. And she says it is about time someone took the lead! Subhadra has a genuine love for wildlife and when she decided to do something that gave her a greater purpose in life – she chose to rescue urban wildlife (snakes, birds, squirrels, etc.).

She actively started to rescue snakes six years ago but that was after spending years assisting her husband and other rescuers and equipping herself with adequate amount of knowledge, training and experience required to rescue, bag and rehabilitate them without causing harm to the snake or herself. Subhadra’s responsibility does not end there, she also makes it a point to educate people, address unreasonable fears, dispel myths and superstitions that surround these shy creatures. She reiterates (every chance she gets), the important role they play in our ecosystem and shares safety tips / precautionary measures in order to prevent death from snakebites. Subhadra, every opportunity she gets, spreads the message to ensure that kids do not develop an unreasonable fear of snakes – in doing so, the younger generation will grow up to be more responsible towards snakes and wildlife in the years to come.

Subhadra who works at a leading financial services firm, tries hard to be available when she gets a rescue call but there have been instances where she has had to find other rescuers to take her place. She does this out of pure passion and says it feels amazing to save the life of a snake which would either have been killed or may have defended itself by hurting humans in close quarters.

Hearing her passion for these reptiles that most people have an aversion to, left me in complete awe. But Subhadra admits that her role comes with several risks and she isn’t talking only about getting bitten. She related incidents where she, “singlehandedly tackled crowds of people wanting to kill the snakes (even if it is a non-venomous one), firmly dealt with snake charmers who de-fang snakes and make them dance to earn a buck, educated people who wanted to use pesticides to kill snakes, etc.” She has done it all but feels that her work is meaningful and “this is the only way we can give back to nature, for the abundance we get in return”, and she thoughtfully adds, “It would be great to see everyone do their bit to preserve the natural food chain and ecosystem which we are solely responsible for slowly destructing.”