STAFF REPORTER
GUWAHATI: The Assam Tourism Development Cooperation (ATDC) released Axomor Aronya, Abhyaranya aruRashtriya Udyan, a book penned by Soumyadeep Datta, Director, Nature's Beckon.
Soumyadeep Datta, a well-known name in the field of wildlife conservation, is an Ashoka fellow and one of India's finest environment activists. His progressive leadership has given a new direction to biodiversity conservation in India. Under his able leadership, Nature's Beckon has led the biodiversity conservation movement of Assam and Northeast India successfully for the past three decades. He is an acclaimed writer who has contributed around 50 valuable books related to the field of environment, wildlife, biodiversity conservation, and travel; this includes few ground breaking books based on original research in the field of Buddha Dharma and Buddhist philosophy. He is well known as one of the most successful travel writers of Assam, his books on Arunachal Pradesh are undeniably the best travel books written on Arunachal Pradesh till date. His travelogues give a vivid tour of the ecologically and culturally rich Himalayas from the remote corners of Arunachal Pradesh, Sikkim to the dry and arid beauty of Leh-Ladakh, Himachal Pradesh and Bhutan.
Forest based travelogues by Datta like Utbhaxito Mayabon and Aranyot Ekhoj Dokhoj along with other books related to wildlife and environment penned by him, have been instrumental in leading the green literature movement in Assam and Northeast India. His travelogues, exceptionally popular among readers, has effectively promoted eco-tourism in Assam and Northeast India. His books have been used as educational materials for training and capacity building in the eco-tourism sector.
Axomor Aronya, Abhyaranya aru Rashtriya Udyan is a unique book on eco-tourism and biodiversity conservation in Assam. This completely coloured book of more than 300 pages provides authentic and most relevant information about the flora, fauna, ecology and other tourist relevant information about all the national parks (seven national parks) and wildlife sanctuaries (19 wildlife sanctuaries) of Assam. This includes information about the two newly-formed national parks of Assam viz; Dihing Patkai National Park and Raimona National Park.
This book also includes checklists of birds and mammals found in these protected areas of Assam. The exquisite cover design of the book showcases two successful conservation stories of Assam, the Golden Langur represents the successful conservation of this endemic species of non-human primate in Western Assam and Hoolock Gibbon represents the successful conservation of the only non-human ape species found in India in the eastern-most corner of Assam. These two incredible conservation stories constitute the illustrious journey of Nature's Beckon through its unstinted advocacy leading the biodiversity conservation movement of Assam for more than three decades. This book also includes the first ever map of Assam showing the national parks and wildlife sanctuaries in Assamese language.
This unique book is dedicated to one of India's most respected statesmen and former Prime Minister of India, Atal Behari Vajpayee. The book carries a special message from Chief Minister of Assam, Himanta Biswa Sarma. In the message, he lauded the progressive approach of Nature's Beckon in spreading the biodiversity conservation consciousness amongst the people of Northeast India and particularly amongst the youngsters.
This book documents some of the recent activities of Nature's Beckon which includes the launch of Ganesh Mangal Yatra, a 10-year long elephant-conservation programme for effective conservation of Asian Elephants and its habitats in Assam. This book also documents the first ever symposium of Sahitya Akademi dedicated to writings on nature/green literature held in Assam in collaboration with Nature's Beckon. This book has been partly sponsored by Oil India Ltd.
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