Vidarbha-based professor Dr Gajanan D Muratkar, known as the ‘Grass Man of India’, has been with the coveted Satpuda Landscape Tiger Partnership (SLTP) Conservation Hero Award for his invaluable grassland conservation efforts in the central Indian landscape.
Dr Muratkar is a professor at Sipna Education Society's Arts, Science and Commerce College at Chikhaldara in Amravati district.
He is popularly known as the 'Grass Man of India' among the forest staff and has pioneered a meadow development technique in which he involves the field level forest staff to identify the local grasses, prepare a seed bank, create mother beds and introduce local grasses systematically to create the meadows.
This technique was developed by him in one of India's oldest tiger reserves -- Melghat Tiger Reserve in Amravati district in 2012.
"In the past ten years, he has used this technique to eradicate weeds and create such meadows in other Tiger reserves and protected areas of Maharashtra, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Telangana, Chattisgarh, Jharkhand, Tamilnadu, Uttarakhand, and Kerala," said Kishor Rithe of Satpuda Foundation, who is one of the partners in the SLTP.
He has been tirelessly working for the past decade in these 10 states and has contributed a lot to tiger conservation. SLTP partners have taken cognisance of this extraordinary work and selected him for a Conservation Hero Award 2022.
Dr. Muratkar is also a recipient of the 2013 Sanctuary Green Teacher Award.
Previously, a dynamic range forest officer Mr Nilesh Gawande, a green reporter Rakhi Chavhan and Sumeri Lal Yadav, Deputy Ranger from Kanha Tiger Reserve have received this prestigious award.