Communities, Conversation, Conservation

Bhavna is a Project Coordinator at Last Wilderness Foundation – an NGO working towards wildlife conservation – since 2010. She has primarily been in charge of coordinating and executing conservation outreach programmes in the villages in the proximity of three prominent tiger reserves in Madhya Pradesh, namely, Kanha, Bandhavgarh and Panna. In this talk at the Nature inFocus festival, August 2017, Bhavna gives an anecdotal account of time spent with communities, the importance of conversation/dialogue and working on field to not only understand the different conservational, conversational issues that exist but also to build on a plethora of memories.

Pushpendra was one of the first students at the Pardhi hostel in Panna, an initiative undertaken by the forest department of Panna Tiger Reserve and WWF to rehabilitate and educate Pardhi students. This is where the Last Wilderness Foundation team met him in 2009. Aided by the determination to study, and the encouragement from his parents, Pushpendra has cleared his standard 11 examination, with a clear aim to study towards a B.S.C. in Agriculture. Pushpendra Pardhi talks about living only in forested areas before 2007, and after being introduced to education and a regular study schedule, he now wants to pursue higher education, something that has made him somewhat of a role model for his community.