Meet Shashank Dalvi - Naturalist, Conservationist, Scientist

This Sanctuary Wildlife Service Award 2017 winner’s career path was set early in childhood. Between walks through Mumbai’s Sanjay Gandhi National Park and explorations through virtually every biogeographic zone on the Indian subcontinent, this remarkable young man has described a new species of bird to science and personally seen and documented as many as 1,190 avian species in India. A longtime associate of author and birding expert, Bikram Grewal, he met him to share both purpose and vision with Sanctuary readers.

- Bikram Grewal

SHASHANK, YOU ARE ONLY 34 YEARS OLD, BUT YOUR INTEREST IN WILDLIFE AND BIRDS ALREADY SPANS OVER A DECADE. TELL US ABOUT YOUR JOURNEY.

I remember being gifted a book on the mammals of India by my grandfather when I was just four. And read it again and again until I knew it by rote. When I was seven our teacher asked us to write on the animal we liked the most, and while most of my friends wrote on dogs and cats, I chose the Asian elephant. My love for birds was born when my grandmother brought home a caged bird. Curious about its identity, I looked in the book Common Birds (India - the Land and People) by Dr. Sálim Ali and Laeeq Futehally and discovered it was a Red-vented Bulbul. Not happy with seeing the bird in a cage, I began to spend virtually every holiday and any spare time I had exploring the Sanjay Gandhi National Park and other birding spots in Mumbai. On one such field trip, I met Dr. Anish Andheria who promised to take me with him every time he came, provided I stopped walking alone inside the national park. Between him and the inimitable Dr. Parvish Pandya, Vice Principal of Bhavan’s College, I was fortunate to be gifted the practical knowledge I needed to launch a life enriched by an understanding of natural history, ecology and conservation. through my high school and college years.

WAS THE WILDLIFE CONSERVATION SOCIETY A KEY STEPPING STONE?