One Thousand Four Hundred And Eleven

That's the number of tigers left standing in India. I don't know about you, but that number nearly brought me to tears. I thought about that number for a minute when I came across it for the first time on Facebook (it was one of my friends' status updates). Do you realize how small the number 1411 is? I'm from India and I'll tell you that when the Parliament hosts a joint session of both houses, there are about eight hundred members of parliament present. One Thousand Four Hundred and Eleven is less than twice that number. Frankly, we'd be better off if the latter was smaller.

If you can't make out the blurb under the picture above, I'll paraphrase it here. There were nearly 40,000 tigers roaming free in India when the British were around. Sixty years of the Indian republic has slashed that number by a factor close to 40. If you are moved by what you're reading here, do something. I came across this number because one of my friends chose to change his status update for some time. Maybe if you change yours, someone who can make a real difference will come across the number too. Remember, you're among a community of 350 million Facebook users. The cub, above, can't even find his mother.

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