Sunita Dhairyam is a wildlife artist and conservationist. She has been living on the borders of the Bandipur Tiger Reserve in Karnataka for more than two decades.
Bandipur is home to a large tiger population. In the last 50 years, the tiger population in India has declined by 90%.
Over the years, Dhairyam has nurtured a close relationship with not just the wildlife in Bandipur but also the local communities in the region. She discovered that the poor tribal communities in the region who rely heavily on cattle rearing for a living often kill tigers that hunt their cattle down.
Locals poison the carcass of a cow or a buffalo for revenge – one of the reasons that’s leading to a decline in the tiger population in the area. To narrow the gap between herself, the locals and the wildlife population, Dhairyam has been educating locals and providing them with compensation for the loss of cattle hunted down by tigers.
Watch the story of her unconditional approach to saving the wildlife brought to you by The Wire and OZY.