Ranajit Das, PhD

Ernst Mayr had once explained “I was a born naturalist, roaming the fields and woods ever since I was a small boy. What most attracted me was the immense diversity of life”. He wondered “Why are there so many different kinds of species?”

Even though I have lived my life within the concrete maze of the city, I can say I have always felt like a naturalist. Memories of the first encounter with the Cuckoo on a balmy February morning and the sight of the ferociously beautiful tiger in the Zoo, captive, yet powerful, are still verdant in my memory. The sounds of the wilderness, that tore through the night, my very first in a jungle, have hung with me many years down the line. Those impressions and many that came later have only fuelled my yearning, for the beckoning natural world and the immense diversity of life that it encompasses. What is beautiful is all that Nature holds within her womb is unknowable and unconquerable. Yet the same rush of emotions has driven human kind to explore life, I share their passion and I know that is what drives the quest to unearth life and creates its science.