An Earth Day awareness event was organised by Working With Nature Group (WWN) and Delhi Development (DDA) at Sanjay Van on 22 April 2015. The event was attended by over 250 students from over 15 schools, 2 colleges as well as some residents of Delhi. The chief Guest at the Function was the VC of DDA. Wildlife SOS team member, Bindia gave a talk and live demonstration on snakes to make people aware about the species of snakes commonly found in Delhi NCR and what to do if the general public encountered any of them. Both Bindia and Lokesh (Wildlife SOS Rescue Team member) showed the audience a variety of non-venomous snakes that had been rescued by Wildlife SOS including, Royal Snake, Rat Snake, Red Sand Boa, Wolf snake and a Common Monitor Lizard.
There was great excitement among the students and other members of the audience during the live demonstration and a much better appreciation and understanding of these much maligned reptiles and all those present expressed a willingness to coexist with them. The audience promised to not harm wild animals if they encountered them within the city and committed to calling our 24X7 Rescue Hotline (the contact number was shared with all present) so animals can be safely rescued. In fact the Wildlife SOS team was called back a second time during the function to share information and show the snakes again.
Information was also shared on first aid measures that should be taken if someone is bitten by a venomous snake and the need for immediately transporting the victim to a Hospital where anti-venom is available for proper treatment by a qualified medical team. Many audience members approached the wildlife SOS team to commend the organisation efforts and asked for information on holding similar wildlife conservation and education events at their institutes.
Wildlife SOS thanks DDA and WWN for organising this event and giving us the opportunity to make people aware about snakes and other wildlife in distress.
