Jairam Ramesh, a Congress leader and former environment minister, said the events that triggered the Great Indian Bustard conservation programme occurred in New Delhi.
These recollections highlight the role of individual advocacy and political will in establishing critical wildlife protections for one of India's most endangered species.
Ramesh said the path toward conservation began with the influence of ornithologist Salim Ali. Ali had proposed the Great Indian Bustard as the national bird in 1961 [1]. While that specific proposal did not result in the bird becoming the national symbol, it established the species' importance within the scientific and political consciousness.
The actual catalyst for the government's conservation programme occurred approximately 50 years ago [2]. Ramesh said the turning point came when then-Prime Minister Indira Gandhi saw a photograph of the bird on the front page of a newspaper [1].
This visual encounter prompted Gandhi to take an interest in the species, which spurred the government to move toward a dedicated conservation effort [2]. The sequence of events illustrates how a combination of long-term expert advocacy and a single moment of high-level political visibility can shift environmental policy.
The conservation programme aimed to protect the bird from extinction as its population dwindled across its native range. Ramesh said the initiative was a result of these specific historical triggers—the 1961 proposal and the later image that caught the Prime Minister's attention [1], [2].
“Salim Ali proposed the Great Indian Bustard as the national bird in 1961.”
The account provided by Ramesh underscores the 'top-down' nature of early Indian environmental policy, where conservation priorities were often triggered by the personal interests of the Prime Minister. It demonstrates that while scientific advocacy—such as that by Salim Ali—provides the necessary foundation, political momentum often requires a visual or emotional catalyst to transition from a proposal to a funded government programme.
