Who owns the conservation narrative?

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Subscribe to enjoy similar stories. Recently, conservationists in Bengaluru had a huge win. The State Board of Wildlife, headed by the Karnataka chief minister, approved a proposal to deem 5,010 acre of grasslands, about 25km outside the city, as the Greater Hesaraghatta Conservation Reserve (GHCR).

This was after successive chief ministers over a decade had rejected the proposal. Conservationists quietly rejoiced and waited for the official order. A week after the news broke on 7 October, filmmaker Amoghavarsha J.S.

posted an Instagram reel about his role in saving the Hesaraghatta grasslands. As a storyteller with over one lakh followers, Amoghavarsha said he was simply “sharing his happiness" at the news. There was one problem: Many felt the filmmaker, whose role had been minimal, was hijacking a conservation story that had involved an entire community and they hadn’t been credited or tagged.

It brings up the question: Who owns the conservation narrative? Siddharth Goenka, a former member of the Karnataka State Wildlife Board, says the proposal to give Hesaraghatta a Conservation Reserve (CR) status came from three petitioners in 2013: Hesaraghatta resident and photographer Mahesh Bhat, the late Ramki Sreenivasan, and Seshadri K.S., fellow-in-residence at Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (Atree). I am not a conservationist but I am a birder. For the 1,500-strong community of naturalists, amateur and professional, in Bengaluru, visiting Hesaraghatta is a weekend ritual.

Grasslands are a refuge for many species including birds, insects and small mammals. This particular grassland is a catchment area as well. “The Hesaraghatta grasslands and Hesaraghatta lake have the potential to become to