Members

Ph.D. Students

Debangini Ray | Ph.D. Student

Debangini Ray is an interdisciplinary ecologist who believes strongly in citizen science action and storytelling as a medium for science communication. She has previously worked with TSA-India, Aaranyak, WCS-India and ATREE, and is presently working with Marine Flagships program at Dakshin Foundation. Her brainchild is The False Trail, a platform where citizens share their observations on urban wildlife. Her PhD focuses on threats to owls and understanding peoples’ perception about owls. Her other interests lie in books and movies, photography, nature journaling, caffeine, cats, and owls!

Arajush Payra | Ph.D. Student

Arajush is crazy about insects. He is involved in the Western Ghats Odonata Project. He is a great field worker and can get lost in the forests! He has 60+ publications to his credit. Recently he led description of Protosticta armageddonia from Kerala State. When not on the field, he prefers eating biryani followed by dozing off.

Nikhil Kuni | Ph.D. Student

Nikhil is a MSc in Zoology from Solapur University. Since beginning he is fascinated by grasslands, spiders, and moths. Over the years, he worked with WII and ZSI and has described several new species of spiders and moths. As a PhD student at MIT-WPU & CUL, he is looking into the impact of urbanization on spider assemblages and asking questions about urban stressors and spiders.

Shubhankar K. | PhD Student

Shubhankar Khangar has completed MSc in Environmental Science with a specialization in Wildlife Conservation from MIT-WPU Pune. He has excellent skills of project and team management. He has worked with Nagpur Ploggers, WildTales, and Bridgestone CSR before joining our team. An avid cat lovers, Shubhankar is responsible to manage the day-to-day activities of CUL. He is good barista and makes sure we have a great party always!!!

Research Students

Pratiksha Chalke | Research Student

Pratiksha is a skilled geoinformatics lady with immense interest in biodiversity and conservation. She works on LULC and change detection to analyze landscape-wide dynamics and carbon sequestration. In her latest work, she demonstrates why urban planning is important for sustainability. Always eager to learn new things and active on CUL WhatsApp group, Pratiksha is one of the most resourceful person we have in here!

Col. (Retd.) Krishnandu Sarkar

A retired army man who took camera in hand for conservation and now have become an integral part of CUL, meet Krishnandu Sarkar, our 56 year old youngest member! Krish has a huge experience working in the field in the most adverse conditions. Today he has focused his research on Broad-tailed Grassbird and Behavioral Ecology of Waders.

Ameya D. | Biodiversity Fellow

Our previous invincible member, Ameya is back in new form as a biodiversity fellow on a long-term project titled Conservation Action Planning for Upper Bhima River. Ameya works across landscapes chasing birds and is a die hard fan of black tea!

Inshiya Vohra | JRF

Inshiya has completed MSc in Environmental Science with a specialization in Wildlife Conservation from MIT-WPU Pune. For her masters dissertaion Inshiya worked on the caged Leopard Behaviora at Jambhugoda WLS, Gujarat . The Leopard Girl is now investigating on the elusive Forest Owlets in Melghat Tiger Reserve as a JRF. Inshiya’s energy is contagious. If you find a short-haired girl aimlessly running here and there in the forests, you have bumped into Inshiya for sure!!!

Dhruv Parmar | JRF

Dhruv has completed MSc in Environmental Science with a specialization in Wildlife Conservation from MIT-WPU Pune. For his dissertation he worked on Odonates of Salt Panes of Dwaraka, Gujarat. Currently posted as a Junior Biologist at Melghat Tiger Reserve, he studies diversity & distribution of odonates. Dhruv has excellent writing and analysis skills and you will find him scribbling in his book if he is not with a binocular.

Joel Philip | MSc Student

Joel has been working on odoantes prior to joining CUL. In his present projects, he looks at how does the degree of protection to landscape shapes the Odonata diversity at Raimona National Park. He is an active member of CUL contributing in several other Odonata projects including the Bhima River and Euphaea phylogenomics project.

Dhruva Bhatt | MSc Student

Dhruva hails from Dandeli where he runs a homestay and is well connected with the forests. At CUL he pursues his interests in various taxa including bees, spiders, and fishes. He is yet exploring and will finally be assigned a project. For now, he is our all rounder intern!

Alumni

  • Amey Paranjape: Project Scientist, WCT, Bandhavgarh TR
  • Shubham More: Freelancer
  • Arjit Jere: Trainer, Dnyan Prabodhini Pune
  • Atharva Kulkarni: Freelancer
  • Swara Bakshi: RRBCEA, Pune
  • Saumitra Dhere: Freelance Naturalist
  • Gokul Madhav: BS-MS student, IISER Trivendrum
  • Nimish Subramanian: PhD Student, CES, IISc
  • Aditya Date: MS student, Germany
  • Tejas Mehendale: Naturalist, Coorg, Karnataka
  • Hrishikesh Karandikar: Project Assistant, WRCS Pune
  • Madhur Rathi: Family Business
  • Divyanshu Pawar: Project Coordinator, Symbiosys Climate Change Center
  • Sourav Dutta: Carbon Analyst, KrypC Bangalore
  • Hrishikesh Dhapate
  • Madhura Agashe: BioGeoSys Lab, National Institute of Science Education and Research (NISER), Bhubaneshwar
  • Rubina Rajan
  • Swagata Das: Pursuing masters
  • Apeksha Darshetkar: Educator with Center for Wildlife Studies (CWS)
  • Nikhil Joshi: Independent educator, Pune
  • Vaidehi Gujarathi: Landscape architect, Tree Public, Pune
  • K. Dolsy David: Research Fellow at WCS, Mumbai
  • Preethi Srinivasan: Research Fellow, BNHS
  • Yash Damania: Software Engineer, Volkswagen India, Pune
  • Abhishek Wahane: Research Intern, NITI Aayog, New Delhi
  • Swaroop Nayak: Technology analyst, Deloitte USI Risk & Financial Advisory
  • Prasath Selvaraj: JRF, SACON, Coimbatore
  • Yash Chaudhari: Trainee Data Scientist, Abzooba India Infotech Pvt Ltd
  • Aakriti Bhat: TCS, Mumbai
  • Aditya Hundekari: ZS Associates, Pune
  • Shravan Paralikar: Independent Researcher

Former Interns

  • Yogesh Kalebere
  • Archita Londhe
  • Yash Khare
  • Sakshi Chakve
  • Aditya Khochare
  • Aishwarya Kasar