India, Dec. 7 -- During the day, the sun's glare cuts off earth from its location in the cosmic array. The celestial dome is veiled in sky blues. It is during the night, coronated by poets as the queen of darkness, that we glimpse our pale blue dot of earth islanded in the splendour of space and a stream of stars. Just as twinkling stars creep out one by one from cosmic crevices as the night deepens, down in the Kansal jungles of the Sukhna Wildlife Sanctuary phantom-like creatures of the night were stirring from their distaste for daylight. It is in such protected, sacred jungles that the ascetic's desire for silence, solitude and a primeval darkness not stabbed by modern light pollution attains consummation.

The forests & wildlife depa...