A tireless voice for tigers and nature conservation [Obituary]

Nature, wildlife, the conservation movement and the tigers in particular have lost their guardian angel in the death of Valmik Thapar in the early hours of May 31 after a brave and tough fight with cancer. He was 73 and still had many dreams for nature and conservation that went unfulfilled. “His inimitable booming voice may have gone silent today, but the fight to save India’s natural treasury will go on by the millions whom he inspired, as well as his family,” his wife Sanjana Kapoor, son Hamir and other members of the family have said.

Though he had no formal training in wildlife biology or conservation, Valmik Thapar learnt both by living in the lap of nature in Ranthambhore in Rajasthan, soon after graduating from St. Stephen’s College in New Delhi. Transformation happened in the mid-seventies when he saw the majestic tigers of the park and struck up a friendship with the then director of the Ranthambhore Tiger Reserve, the legendary Fateh Singh Rathore. Both were outspoken, had strong views on wildlife and conservation and could take up cudgels with all those having views contrarian to theirs.

In the early eighties, when movement and activity inside the Ranthambhore reserve was restricted, tigers that were normally spotted only at night, could be seen in the daytime. One of Valmik’s favourite tigers was Genghis Khan. Walking alongside the Padam talab, Genghis would stalk and pull down a large sambar. Catching and killing prey in lakes, especially the large sambar, was seen as an unusual form of tiger predation. Valmik followed Genghis’ escapades regularly and caught on camera several episodes of the male tiger hunting wild boar and sambar around and inside the three lakes of Ranthambhore. Deeply in love with Ranthambhore, Valmik ensured expansion of the tiger reserve by including Kaila Devi Sanctuary within it.

Valmik authored, co-authored and edited around 32 books on tigers, nature and wildlife and helped produce several films and videos for television round the world. His narration was always riveting, and a fine example of his oratory skills was evident in the Land of the Tiger series for BBC. As wildlife filmmaker Subbiah Nallamuthu pointed out, “He was the voice through which Indian tigers spoke to the world.” Valmik spoke fearlessly at various platforms and had a global following. His constant refrain was that India’s national parks and sanctuaries are the country’s natural treasury. We have to fight to preserve it.

A pioneer on community-based conservation in India, the Ranthambhore Foundation, a non-profit which he helped set up, worked in about 100 villages around the tiger reserve on primary health care, dairy development based on stall feeding of cattle and re-wilding barren and degraded land.  He was a proponent of the Ranthambhore School of Art and roped in Dastkar, an NGO working with craftspeople, to set up a women’s cooperative that would keep alive the traditional crafts of women and create livelihoods for displaced villagers. Wonderful paintings on the majestic tiger were made by local talent and decorated many a drawing room in Delhi and abroad. This created international recognition for artists of Ranthambhore while promoting tiger conservation worldwide.

In his 2011 book Tigers – My Life: Ranthambhore and Beyond he says, “My fight was always for inviolate spaces where the tiger could live free, away from noise, away from humans.”

Over the years Valmik worked with the National Board for Wildlife, was the wildlife expert on the Central Empowered Committee (CEC) for Forests of the Supreme Court of India and several other committees in India where he spoke up for India’s voiceless wildlife.

Among the many battles he has fought an important one was on mining in Kudremukh National Park. While the CEC supported a five-year winding up period for mining, Valmik gave a dissenting report and wanted mining to stop immediately. He called the National Park, “Nature’s Taj Mahal, a biodiversity hotspot of the Western Ghats”. The Court asked him to substantiate his dissenting note, so he did a site inspection and submitted a video report. Mining was eventually stopped by court orders.

Since battles for wildlife conservation had often to be fought in the court rooms, in 1998 Valmik persuaded a group of lawyers interested in wildlife conservation to form LAW-E (Legal Action for Wildlife and Environment), a Non-Profit Public Charitable Trust which worked for protection of the environment in general and forests and wildlife in particular. LAW-E went on to provide policy, legislative and administrative inputs to the Ministry of Environment and Forests as well as to State governments and legal advice and support to individuals and NGOs.

In 1993, he was the driving force in creating the Cat Specialist Subgroup of the IUCN in India, which comprised a dedicated group of field researchers, retired forest officers, experts and lawyers. All the big names in wildlife conservation were included – Deb Roy, Brijendra Singh, M.K. Ranjitsinh, Ullas Karanth, Fateh Singh Rathore, Belinda Wright, A.J.T. John Singh, Divyabhanusinh Chavda and others.

To make conservation work rewarding, in 2001 Valmik collaborated with the German company Zeiss and the Carl Zeiss Wildlife Conservation Awards were instituted for outstanding work by conservation workers, including  forest rangers and guards, policy makers and others. It became an important annual event in Delhi and the awardees went home happy with top-class binoculars, motivating them to do more field work.

In 2005, when newspapers reported the disappearance of tigers from the Sariska Wildlife Reserve in Rajasthan, the then prime minister set up a Tiger Task Force to strengthen tiger conservation in the country. It was headed by V. P. Singh Badnore, then a Member of Parliament from Bhilwara and Valmik was one of its members and an important driving force. The committee recommended increased night patrolling in the Sariska Reserve, assistance of 150 home guards and stoppage of all tourists from July 1 to September end. A few tigers were translocated to Sariska from Ranthambhore and slowly their numbers increased in Sariska.

Valmik was among the few conservationists who vehemently opposed the introduction of cheetahs into Kuno National Park. In the 2013 book Exotic Aliens: The Lion and the Cheetah in India, in which he was a co-author, he questioned the existence of wild lions and cheetahs in India. He said he had found sufficient historical evidence to suggest that lions and cheetahs were historically imported from Africa to appease the demands of the Islamic rulers who kept them in menageries and hunted them in the large enclosures in which they were kept. He said thousands of lions and cheetahs were imported into India, and some may have escaped from the royal menageries and settled down in the wild. He said more research was needed to conclusively prove that lions and cheetahs did exist in the wilderness in India and were not exotic animals. His punchline was, “I love both these animals and would rather watch them in their natural habitat – the wild open grasslands and bush country of Africa. They were never part of Indian wild and, to my mind, will never be.”

As an active member of the Governing Body of the Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun, Valmik was instrumental in enhancing its accountability and worked fiercely to defend its independence and autonomy. Valmik always helped and supported those engaged in wildlife conservation. Kishore Rithe, who was with an Amravati-based NGO and is now Director, Bombay Natural History Society, recalls how Valmik sent him to Ullas Karanth in Nagarahole to learn about population estimation techniques. He even arranged a vehicle for him to do his field work in the Central Indian landscape from Melghat tiger reserve to Tadoba Andhari, to Kanha and Navegaon Nagzira and the surrounding forest areas. Since Valmik had a voice in the wildlife sector, his support to fight illegal fishing and mining in the Pench Tiger Reserve and Tadoba respectively was invaluable, says Rithe.

Tiger Link, another project that Valmik promoted, aimed to connect all stakeholders in tiger conservation. It was formed in 1995 to raise awareness and protect the species. Its members included tribal groups and wildlife conservationists. The Tiger Link newsletter was distributed widely to policymakers. NGOs concerned with wildlife conservation and even the media. In fact, it was often a source for news stories.

Dharmendra Kandpal, who worked closely with Valmik in Ranthambhore says, “His deep affection for the people of Ranthambhore was evident. Whether it was an officer, a junior staff member or a village resident, he always remembered and appreciated them, especially those that served during the early days of the reserve. He would often speak about their stories, stressing the importance of bringing these stories to the world before they disappeared. Whenever he came to Ranthambhore, he made it a point to gather an array of the local people, talked about their contributions and inspired them to act in the service of Ranthambhore and its tigers.”

Though Valmik Thapar has left this world physically, his spirit still hovers around the lakes and forests of Ranthambhore. He will remain in the hearts of people he has inspired, and his many books and documentary films will remain testimony to a man who gave a voice to tigers and put them on the world map.

With inputs from Mahendra Vyas.

Usha Rai is a veteran journalist, and Mahendra Vyas is a naturalist lawyer who worked with Valmik Thapar in many forest and wildlife committees.

Banner image: A tiger in Ranthambhore. Image by Astajyoti1 via Wikimedia Commons (CC BY-SA 4.0).