Iptishamun Nesha

Iptishamun comes from the wetland-rich Lower Gangetic Floodplain. Lucky to be situated in the biodiversity-rich state of West Bengal, she had the opportunity to visit various ecosystems from Eastern Himalayas to Terai floodplains to semi-arid landscapes and finally the Sundarbans delta. During her Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Zoology, which she was pursuing from Calcutta University and Vidyasagar University respectively, she volunteered for Kolkata based organization, H.E.A.L, The Fishing Cat Project and for her college Shyampur Siddheswari Mahavidyalaya’s eco-club. She got to understand how complicated conservation is outside protected areas (PAs) and the importance of involving multiple stakeholders. This helped her when she worked as a field researcher at Chilika Lagoon, Odisha, on a project to estimate fishing cat populations - the first time such an exercise was conducted outside PAs. Apart from placing camera traps and monitoring them, her work entailed coordinating with panchayats, enforcement and management authorities.

Working in Chilika has been eye-opening for her in many ways. It introduced her to another wetland ecosystem. While she was thrilled to see the ecological similarities, it was amazing to observe the differences. It was all the more interesting to see how life forms are changing along a gradient with the seasons – from freshwaters to salty waters. These natural history observations piqued her interest - How do flood-pulse and salinity across seasons affect odonate (a type of predatory insect) assemblages – a taxonomic group she studied during her master’s thesis. Additionally, Chilika faces tremendous stress from hydrological changes, upstream land use practices, intensive aquaculture and invasive species. Creating a comprehensive inventory of odonates here will help develop a robust metric to monitor its health. The project will enable her to integrate odonates into existing wetland education programs in the landscape and offer an opportunity to involve local school students in appreciating their ecological heritage.

Priyank Patil

Priyank is a marine biologist and researcher with a strong interest in marine ecology and participatory approaches to conservation. He focuses on bridging scientific research with local knowledge to highlight overlooked species and habitats, particularly along India's west coast. His work often involves field-based ecological surveys and community-led data collection to support inclusive conservation strategies.

For the Inlaks-Ravi Sankaran Grant, he will be working on a project titled ‘Identifying Critical Habitats and Assessing Seasonal Variation of the Critically Endangered Glaucostegus obtusus along the Uttara Kannada Coast, Karnataka’, to address the urgent knowledge gaps surrounding the Bottlenose Guitarfish, a Critically Endangered and Schedule I protected species in India. Despite its legal protection and ecological significance, no species-specific conservation efforts are in place.

The project aims to integrate Local Ecological Knowledge (LEK) from artisanal fishing communities with walking transect-based ecological surveys in nearshore intertidal zones. These methods will help identify and characterise nursery habitats, understand seasonal trends in sightings, and provide baseline data for population assessments. 

Through fisher engagement, field monitoring, and spatial mapping, the study hopes to uncover key habitats used by juvenile guitarfish—insights that are crucial for recommending localised conservation interventions and improving on-ground enforcement of Schedule I protections. Additionally, the project will invest in community capacity-building through awareness outreach and the training of local youth or students. This work not only contributes to species-specific conservation but also strengthens the role of small-scale communities in marine stewardship, aligning well with broader conservation and policy goals in India.

Srinidhi Himani

Srinidhi is an aspiring marine biologist and science communicator. She developed a fascination with marine life at an early age, through the medium of encyclopedias, seashells and books. She completed her Bachelor’s in Biotechnology, Chemistry and Zoology from Bangalore University and her Master’s in Marine biology and Oceanography from the Centre for Advanced Studies in Marine Biology, Annamalai University.

Her latest project, Seasploration, is a youth-led initiative focused on blending traditional seafood wisdom from Tamil coastal communities with scientific data, amplifying local voices and fostering awareness around sustainable seafood practices. Through a mix of fieldwork, interviews, digital content and community engagement, she hopes to document and preserve indigenous knowledge and traditional fisherfolk knowledge about marine life, fisheries and ocean-based livelihoods. The science communication and story telling pages @seasploration and @seasplorer.tamil on Instagram and YouTube communicate and share the journey of this project. It is bilingual to make it accessible to a wider audience.

Her project involves participatory research, interviews with coastal fishing communities and the co-creation of science content rooted in local realities. By working with both elders and youth, she aims to generate tools for collective ocean stewardship and conservation storytelling. Through her project, she wants to make marine science inclusive and accessible, as she believes that education and awareness play a very important role in marine conservation and sustainable coexistence with the marine environment. This project aims to help empower and uplift traditional fisherfolk communities by helping to provide them with a platform to share their knowledge and voice their concerns. It also aims to help make marine science more accessible to them and the general public using meetings and social media to help them make informed decisions and sustainable seafood choices.