25-05-2025
Radheshyam Bishnoi: Wildlife conservationist known for works on GIB
There wasn't an injured great Indian bustard, chinkara or vulture that Radheshyam Bishnoi heard of that he wouldn't go out of his way to help. Bishnoi, 28, was a passionate conservationist, as good as they come. His work in and around the Thar desert in Rajasthan has been instrumental in protecting the lives and often-overlooked habitats of some of India's most vulnerable animals, particularly the critically endangered great Indian bustard (GIB).
The desert was Radheshyam Bishnoi's life. On Friday, his life tragically ended when his jeep collided head-on with a truck on National Highway 11. Bishnoi and his fellow passengers – conservationist Shyamlal Bishnoi, one Kawaraj Singh Bhadaria who runs a gaushala, and forest staffer Surendra Choudhary, who also died in the accident – were chasing down a lead about deer poaching in the region.
'Radheshyam's demise is a terrible loss for conservation,' Sutirtha Dutta, a scientist at the Wildlife Institute of India, who works on the great Indian bustard's captive breeding programme. 'He has been one of the strongest defenders of wildlife in India and played a critical role in building the support for nature conservation among local people in the Thar. He was a voice from within, a man of the soil.'
Indeed, Bishnoi belonged from the Bishnoi community of Rajasthan, who are known for their environmental stewardship. His staunch dedication to his land and its non-human inhabitants arose from the 29 tenets of his community's founding leader, Guru Jambhoji, who preached respect and kindness towards all life.
Bishnoi grew up in Dholiya village. He spent his childhood trying to rescue injured animals. 'But I could only save few of them,' he told me in when I interviewed him for a story on working in the desert's extreme condition. He worked with veterinarians at the Jodhpur Rescue Centre where he picked up first aid and met conservationists who told him of the plight of the GIB and the threats to their habitat.
He returned to Pokhran where he started monitoring bustard habitats, documenting biodiversity, and engaging with local communities. Over time, he built a huge network of informants that involve a cattle and camel herders, sheperds and farm labourers scattered across the desert. They help monitor GIB collisions with power lines, pick up accident victims from railway tracks and play a critical role in anti-poaching activities.
'Radheshyam and his team were very good at fieldwork because they grew up there and are well aware about the local ecology and the pattern or behaviour of the animals they are protecting as well as their threats,' says Omesh Bajpai, scientific advisor(honourary) at the Plant and Environmental Research Institute, who's worked closely with Bishnoi while surveying the region's biodiversity and their vulnerabilities from the burgeoning wind and solar power industries.
They have been known to rally around him at a moment's notice, and join in his mission to protect the desert. In his book My Head For A Tree: The Extraordinary Story of the Bishnoi, Guardians of Nature (2025), Martin Goodman writes about how Bishnoi climbed transmission towers and threatened to jump if the forest department didn't fit reflectors onto electric wires.
Below him, a group from his network had gathered to protect the body of a GIB and prevent the forest guard from burying it. The bird, known for its poor vision, had flown into the lines and been electrocuted. Bishnoi had long been campaigning for the lines to be moved underground, or at least be fitted with reflectors. His protest had worked.
'The area I live in has taught me flexibility and the ability to adapt,' Bishnoi had told me. 'Stray dogs, solar a power infrastructure, poaching and encroachment can pose serious threats to the Thar. But I know change is possible.'
He also helped build over 100 watering holes across the Pokharan region, where chinkara and other wildlife can hydrate in the desert's punishing summer.
In his short but remarkable career, Bishnoi has been offered jobs - with the forest department and research institutes - which he'd always turn down.
'It was something we'd have long debates about,' says Bajpai. 'He believed he would be most effective working independently, and not be caught up with the bureaucracy of being affiliated with an institute. I couldn't argue much either that.'
With his death, India had lost one of its brightest stars in conservation.
