Shillong, Aug 22: After successfully hosting His Holiness, the Dalai Lama for its 6th Convocation, Martin Luther Christian University has now invited renowned Environmentalist and filmmaker Mike Pandey, as the Convocation speaker and Chief Guest at the University’s 7th Convocation which will be held on 27th August 2014 in Shillong.
Born to Indian parents in Kenya, Pandey’s love and respect for nature started from an early age. The Nairobi National Park, at the back of his house, provided a rich source of inspiration for both Mike and his brother Ishwar. “I grew up right next to the Nairobi National Park, where elephants would raid my mother’s kitchen garden and lions’ calls would wake us at night,” he reminisced.
Mike’s adventures with the camera started when he was barely seven when an uncle presented him a Kodak Browning Box camera on his birthday. He still owns this heirloom. Trained and educated in the UK and US the brothers experiences have been wide and varied from training in Hollywood, USA as interns, to Director of special effects and war scenes in films like Razia Sultan, Betaab, Gazab etc. in India. But the call of the wild was strong and Mike’s passion and care for the natural world pulled him back to Indian wildlife.
He has won over 300 awards for his work to spread awareness about biodiversity and species conservation, including a huge role in the conservation and protection of key species such as whale sharks, elephants, tigers, vultures and horseshoe crabs.
Mike Pandey is globally honoured & renowned for his pioneering and landmark conservation work. He is India’s iconic wildlife conservationist and Environmentalist/Filmmaker.
In 1994, he became the first Asian producer/director to win the Wildscreen Panda Award, also known as the Green Oscar, for his film “The Last Migration – Wild Elephant Capture” in Surguja. In 2000, his film Shores of Silence: Whale Sharks in India, won the Green Oscar for the second time. The film led to the ban on the killing of whale sharks on Indian shores. On October 2004, he did India proud once again by winning the Green Oscar for the Third time for his film Vanishing Giants – a story of his passion and involvement with elephants. This film also led to the ban of cruel and outdated techniques of elephant capture in India.
In its October 2009 edition Times Magazine-USA declared Mike as “Hero of the Environment”, and the Sunday Statesman Magazine, July 2003 called him “Nature’s Guardian Angel”.
He is the producer of India’s longest running environmental and wildlife series called “Earth Matters” reaching over 800 million people in several countries in different languages. As a result of which 67% of rural Indian are aware of environmental concern as against 47% in Europe and America.
Mr. Pandey has expressed great excitement over his first visit to Shillong and he has also conveyed to us his eagerness to interact with the youth of the city and also the policy makers so as to help us with his tools of wisdom to help restore our environment.
His objective is “to bring Citizen Science to people because only when you understand you begin to respect, and what you respect, you love and protect”.
Mr. Pandey further added, “In short, we have to understand the link between our lives and nature because life on earth is interdependent and inter-connected and we are the weakest of the species.”
“The Earth matters to all of us. Don’t just drive to work, look around you, see the birds and the trees and if there is something going wrong, set it right”(SP News)
