Daily Times

CHENGALPATTU: A small scythe, a crowbar and a bundle of canvas bags are all that Kali and Vedan carry when they venture into the fields of southern India to catch some of the world´s deadliest snakes.

They have inherited this skill from their elders of the Irula tribe. These snake catchers are crucial for the production of anti-venom in India which has the world´s highest number of deaths from snake bites.

Since it began in the 1970s, the Irula snake-catchers´ cooperative on the outskirts of the southern city of Chennai has revolutionised the treatment of snake-bites in India, enabling it to produce enough anti-venom to supply hospitals across the country.

Kali learned the intricate skill of tracking and then catching snakes from his father, whose abilities were renowned in the small community.

Now the 36-year-old uses the same skills to catch snakes for the cooperative, which keeps them for a month under licence from the government and harvests their venom before returning them to nature.

This month he is tasked with catching the Russell´s vipersone of India´s deadliest snake .

Within 20 minutes of starting the search in rice fields less than a mile (kilometre) from a busy highway, he has spotted the snake concealed under the bark of a fence post

Kali gets 300 rupees ($4.5) for the viper under a tariff system that rises to 2,500 rupees for a cobra.

Sometimes Kali gets lucky and finds a snake quickly; other times, the search may go for days but the money they receive is good and unlike him, Kali’s children are able to attend school regularly.

India has 244 snake species and the four most venomous, the cobra, krait, Russell´s viper and saw-scaled viper are found throughout the country.

Thousands of people die every year from snakebites in India and majority of them are farmers who at risk of being bitten every time they go into their fields but the government statistics do not show the true picture as most cases go unreported because victims never reach hospital on time and as per an independent study done in 2011, the number of annual deaths due to snake bites were around 46,000.