National Advisors and Consultants
Mr. Sunil Limaye
(Retired IFS)
National Adviser, Wildlife Conservation
Mr. Sunil Limaye retired as the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests and Chief Wildlife Warden of Maharashtra State recently in July, 2022. He earlier served as the additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (Wildlife) West Mumbai and prior to that as an Additional PCCF (Wildlife) East and Managing Director of Maharashtra State Ecotourism Board, Nagpur. He has served in various capacities as a Conservator of Forests and Director, Sanjay Gandhi National Park, whereby he started the initiative ‘Mumbaikars for SGNP’ in order to actively involve and promote active participation of all the probable stakeholders to address the issue of Human- Leopard Conflict. He holds a Masters in Forestry and a Diploma in Wildlife Management from Wildlife Institute of India. He has keen interest in research in conservation and has several publications to his credit. He has been an adviser to the Forest Officials of Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh,Uttarakhand, Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Himachal Pradeshpertaining to the issues of management of Human-Wildlife Interface. Researchers have attributed to him the names of biological species namely 1. Cnemaspislimayei( Limaye Day Gecko)andJerzegosunillimayei(Jumping Spider). He has set an example as a dynamic personality with excellent ‘Conservation Leadership Traits’.
Mr. Bivash Ranjan
(Retired IFS)
National Adviser, Conservation Planning
Mr. Bivash Ranjan, retired as the Additional Director General of Forest and Co-chair and Thematic lead under Environment and Climate Sustainability Working Group of G 20, has worked as an Indian Forest Service (IFS) official and managed multiple desks Forests & Wildlife management, Land restoration, Species conservation, the National Mission for Green India, Desertification Cell. He also chaired the Standing Committee of Global Land Initiative (GLI), established under UNCCD. He owns varied international exposure in policy initiatives for natural resource management.
He is a highly experienced Indian bureaucrat with 35 years of experience in Forestry, Wildlife Conservation, Landscape Approaches for Sustainable Development, Community-based Natural Resources, Biodiversity Conservation and Enrichment, Landscape Ecology, and Climate Change.
He is a member of the Indian Forest Services who has served in Uttar Pradesh and the Government of India in various capacities and successfully demonstrated expertise in strategic planning, high-level negotiation, project management, grant management, policy research, evaluation, stakeholder engagement, and cross-functional team leaderships.
Mr. Anil Kumar Bhardwaj
(Retired IFS)
National Adviser, Human Dimensions in Conservation
Dr. Anil Kumar Bhardwaj is from 1985 batch of Indian Forest Service, Kerala Cadre. He has a professional and Academic experience of 38 years in the field of Wildlife Conservation and Forestry. He has managed a number of Protected Areas (PAs) in southern Western Ghats of Kerala. During his tenure as a Director of Periyar Tiger Reserve, he initiated participatory management approaches through ecodevelopment programme which has transformed this tiger reserve as one of the model areas for participatory PA management in the country. Concept of Foundations initiated in Periyar during his period, has now been extended at to all the tiger reserves in India. He retired as Principal Chief Conservator of Forests, Chief Wildlife Warden and Head of Forest Force of Kerala in 2018.
He has worked in Wildlife Institute of India (WII) for about 15 years. During this period, he has headed two important departments of the institute and handles a number of national and international projects. Dr. Bhardwaj has extensively worked in the area of ecodevelopment and designed competence-based training programmes for participatory biodiversity conservation. He has also been involved in designing of guidelines for ecodevelopment planning and curricula for landscape conservation programmes. After his retirement, he has been engaged as a Senior Professional Fellow in WII. Currently he is associated with the institute as Community Mobilization Expert for river conservation programmes.
His major areas of interest are park-people interface, community livelihoods and biodiversity conservation, ecotourism and management planning for protected areas & large landscapes. He is a member of World Commission on Protected Areas, IUCN Sustainable use Group; IUCN Environmental, Economic and Social Policy Group; Indian Regional Association for Landscape Ecology; Biodiversity Conservation Society of Kerala and Advisor & Board Member of Ambika Prasad Research Foundation.