Sunil Harsana and Nitesh Kaushik

​

Sunil Harsana is a homegrown conservationist from Mangar Bani who has spent over a decade of his life preserving the floral and faunal diversity in the National Capital Region (NCR)-Aravallis region, the last remaining natural forest of this landscape. He has also worked extensively to spread awareness among the Mangar Bani community and, during his work, has unearthed evidence of a pre-historic civilisation in the NCR-Aravallis area.

Nitesh Kaushik is a conservationist who completed her Master's in Biodiversity and Conservation from Guru Gobind Singh Indraprastha University. She has previously contributed to a baseline study of flora to establish the Damdama Biodiversity Park, in Haryana, by documenting the diversity of plants and communities' traditional knowledge and use of various species. Her main interests lie in understanding the relationship between humans and nature.

Sunil and Nitesh are working in the Aravallis of south Haryana, an important leopard corridor, between the Sariska Wildlife Sanctuary, in Rajasthan, and the Asola Bhatti Wildlife Sanctuary, in Delhi. Their project focuses on understanding leopard ecology and enhancing human-leopard coexistence in the area.