The Times of India, 31 August 2011, reports:
SPARING A THOUGHT FOR THE SPARROW
"There's a reason why they call Sadhana Rajkumar the "sparrow queen". After all, she has made it her mission to get the little brown birds back into the city. For a whole year now, Sadhana, a diet and fitnes consultant by profression, has been making sparrow nests and handing them out to Chennaites in the hope that someday the house sparrows will come back.
" 'I was inspired by my mother', says Sadhana. 'She mentioned to me one day that she was sad that she culd no longer see sparrows in the city. That's when I started doing research on the birds and found out that thye were actually quite important ecoologically too,' she adds.
So Sadhana decided to get started on the project. She got Lakshmanan, a carpenter in Perambur, to make sparrow nestboxes out of waste wood and started handing them out to friends.
"Sadhana got so involved in the project and the response she received that she decided to continue with the project. 'Every now and then we hand the nestboxes out at Marina Beach and other places in the city. I have given away 60 so far,' says Sadhana.
"Her nesting project seems to have met with some success. Stockbroker Divya Reddy, one of the first to pick up a nestbox, says the sparrows came to the nest three days after she put it up. 'I just put in a little hay, dried grass and they started flying in.'
"Paper mart owner J Jehangir got his nestbox from Sadhana five months ago while he was on his morning walk at the Marina. 'She was just standing there handing them out, so my friends and I thought, why not get some. Ten of us picked them up and I am glad I did because the sparrows are coming.'
Sadhana keeps in touch with the people who have taken the nests to see if the sparrows are coming. 'We have found that they are coming back to areas ike Chepauk and Mylapore but not yet in other parts. Now, I'm asking people to create mud baths and put some grains along with the nests in the hope that it lure them,' says Sadhana.
