Fish Ratings – Mumbai – May 21 2025: Fish Ratings has quickly affirmed Moringua Hodgarti, a rare Himalayan swamp eel, at ‘BB+’ with a Negative Outlook after our analyst Narendra Mola caught sight of one in Arunachal Pradesh for the first time in over 100 years.
The Moringua hodgarti was first documented during the ‘Abor Expedition’ of 1911-1912, when the British Indian Army set out to punish the Adi tribes of the Siang Valley, burning villages and destroying food stores, in response to the massacre of a British officer and his entourage after the officer had insulted a tribesman.
When the eel saw what was going on, it sensibly disappeared for a century.
But not before Richard Arthur Hodgart, a zoological collector at the Indian Museum in Calcutta, assigned it a preliminary ‘BB+’ rating.
When our analyst recently rediscovered the eel, which is characterised by the absence of paired fins, the fish inquired as to whether the British forces were still suppressing the Adi.
The eel was relieved to hear that the British had left, that India had been independent since 1947 and that the state government had taken steps to protect Adi culture and halt large-scale logging.
But when it heard about the recent conflict between India and Pakistan and skirmishes on the disputed Indian-Chinese border since 2020, the swamp-dwelling creature looked disappointed.
Said the eel: “In that case, I’ll see you in another 100 years.”
It seems like a sensible fish, but the rating is constrained to speculative grade due to the lack of data.
Fish Ratings PRO 