Conservation Chronicles: Stories from the Wild
Nature is not just a beautiful backdrop. It is a fragile, breathing world we often intrude upon. Here, I share the stark realities of our wild spaces, from the hidden struggles of wildlife to the quiet impact of our daily habits.
On a wintry day near Jaipur, I witnessed this grim chase. A pack of feral dogs had cornered a Nilgai, India’s largest antelope. This is a difficult but necessary story to tell, highlighting the rising threat that free-ranging dogs pose to our native wildlife, a conflict often overlooked.
The chase continues. The pack of dogs relentlessly pursues the female Nilgai along the edge of the wetland. Such events are becoming increasingly common at the interface of human settlements and wild spaces.
The Nilgai runs for its life, with the pack of dogs in hot pursuit. The next morning, she was found dead. Precise data on this threat is not clearly realized, but it is huge and rising.
The terrified Nilgai plunges into the water to escape, scattering the waterfowl. The dogs, however, are undeterred and follow her into the wetland.
The dogs close in on the Nilgai in the water. This is a brutal moment of conflict, a direct consequence of the growing population of unmanaged domestic animals in wildlife habitats.
The chase is a desperate struggle for survival. This series of images serves as a stark visual record of a conservation crisis that needs urgent attention across India.
As far as the eye can see, the debris and detritus of our wasteful lifestyles intrude on nature. Here, a child wades through water choked with plastic and garbage, with the forest and city in the background. Oh, what a wonder we are letting fade.
Even a beautiful sky reflected on the water cannot hide the plastic bag floating like an ugly scar. As a people, we don't seem overly concerned, but our insensitive habits are ruining the character of our natural world.
This image from 1985 remains special to me. I found this little tribal lad in the northern zone of SGNP. He held a dead bird, a Puff-throated Babbler, hunted with a simple arrow. He knew the living forest in a way that is now almost lost.
About Conservation Chronicles: Stories from the Field
My approach to conservation photography is not about creating a pleasant wall hanging. It is about documenting the raw friction between human activity and the wild. When you look at my series on the Nilgai or the plastic debris in our wetlands, you are seeing a conflict that is rarely discussed. I capture these difficult moments because ignoring them is exactly what leads to the erasure of our natural heritage.
True conservation is not merely about preserving the majestic; it is about addressing the messy, uncomfortable realities of our time.
The Human-Wildlife Interface
Many of my images capture the friction at the edge of the forest. In my documentation of the Nilgai (Bluebull) chase near Jaipur, I witnessed how free-ranging domestic dogs are becoming a silent, rising threat to our native species. These are not isolated incidents, but symptoms of a wider disconnect between our urban sprawl and the wildlife that still manages to thrive on the periphery.
The Cost of Convenience
When I point my lens at the debris in a wetland, it is because I want us to confront the 'detritus' of our lifestyles. We see a landscape, but we often overlook the plastic bag floating like an ugly scar or the industrial runoff choking a stream. These images serve as a visual record of what we are allowing to fade into memory.
Learning from the Past
I often reflect on the early days of my work. An image I captured in 1985 of a tribal lad in SGNP reminds me of a time when the knowledge of the forest was intimate and deeply connected to survival. That level of understanding is becoming rare. Through my lens and my writing, I hope to reignite that connection, urging us to consider that our daily habits have consequences. My photography is an attempt to translate the language of nature into stories that we cannot afford to ignore.
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