Nayi Khoj - नई खोज

Nayi Khoj - नई खोज

After completing his basic education from Ahmedabad, Kartikeya V. Sarabhai received a Tripos at natural science from the University of Cambridge, England and postgraduate studies in MIT, USA.

Kartikeya took the initial work in education at the Vikram Sarabhai Community Science Center. He established Vikasat (Vikram Sarabhai Center for Development Interaction) in 1977 and the Sunderbans Nature Education Center in 1979. In the early 80's, he managed to establish the WWF's branch in Ahmedabad. Until recently, he was Chairman of North Gujarat Branch of WWF.

Kartikeya is the founder director of the Center for Environmental Education. This is a national center which provides financial support from the Ministry of Environment and Forests of the Government of India. This center is related to the Nehru Foundation for Development. He is also the provincial chairman of the IUCN Commission for Addiction and Communication.

If someone had asked me about my interests in the beginning of the seventies, surely it does not include words like 'wildlife', 'nature' or 'environment'. My interest in all of this was in the meantime, but it would be difficult to give credit to any particular incident because there were so many things which were important. But if I want to identify one of the 'phenomena' for this, then it started with a pair of hygrosity (Athena Bramas) in our garden. My wife, Rajshree (Raju), was seen sitting in a pallet of Pelotoform tree (Pelotoform Roxbargy) in our garden in Ahmedabad, a pair of swells. Both of them were like little kids in appearance and were dancing their heads in a very interesting manner. We observed them every evening for a few days. A few days later Raju's birthday was about to arrive and I thought of offering him a bouquet of books on that occasion. There was indeed a similar book in the Pocket Bookshops located near the Natraj theater. There was a photograph on his cover in which an owl was catching the dead mouse in his beak. I was a little frightened by seeing him. What is its relation with the oysters of our garden! At that time my feelings about natural beauty were not so deep. I could not enjoy that photograph, and in the end I did not buy that book.