Valmik Thapar is a naturalist, conservationist and writer. He has authored, co-authored and edited more than 25 books and several articles; he has produced a range of programmes for television and has devoted four decades to the tiger and its habitat.
He is today a severe critic of government policy regarding tigers, wildlife and the habitat they live in. He continues to campaign and fight for a new way of thinking and action in the governance of the natural world in India.
His stewardship of the Ranthambore Foundation was recognised and he was appointed a member of the Tiger Task Force of 2005 by the Government of India. He criticised the majority Task Force view in his dissent note as excessively focussed on the prospects of co-existence of tigers and humans, which was, in his view not consistent with the objective of the panel.
His writings have analysed the perceived failure of Project Tiger, a conservation apparatus created in 1973 by the Government of India. He has critiqued Project Tiger, drawing attention to its mismanagement by a forest bureaucracy that is largely not scientifically trained. His most recent book The Last Tiger (Oxford University Press) makes this case strongly.
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