Growing up in Nepal, Shovna Upadhyay felt an inexplicable sense of inner calm in rare trips to the wilderness. She was stirred by awe and wonder at the natural world.
It was only in later life, as she wandered between Bhutan, the UK, Thailand and finally settled in Delhi that she answered the call of the wild. A visit to Corbett National Park in North India reignited her passion for nature and to integrate it with hobby photography.
Today, she is a noted wildlife photographer, known internationally for capturing images of animals in their candid moments. Her first book, My Tigers, My Stories, has photos of her encounters with the elusive and endangered cats. She weaves her own story with those of the tigers she meets.
Upadhyay’s second book, Our Jungles, My Stories, was released recently in New Delhi and Kathmandu. Here, she ventures beyond tigers and presents a collection of her adventures in the wild, including unexpected encounters, safaris, and stories about people living in proximity to wild animals.
Once, she came face-to-face with a tigress named Kankatti in a national park in India. Upadhyay recalls: “She lowered her head and looked directly at me. Our eyes met. Then I noticed that the tigress only had one eye. There was something incredibly powerful and moving about that meeting with a one-eyed tigress.”
The encounter with a tiger that had lost an eye and a bit of her ear in a fight probably while defending her cubs, left a lasting impression on Upadhyay and rekindled a lifelong fascination with tigers, wildlife photography, and the natural world.
In another encounter, a tiger named Bijli and three cubs suddenly appeared in front of her safari jeep. The driver whispered to her that whatever she did, not to make eye contact with the tigress. Upadhaya remembers sitting absolutely still while the driver tried to extricate their jeep from the mud.
The driver ducked under the steering, but Upadhayay just could not take her eyes off the mother tiger and her cubs. Tigers do not attack people unless threatened or they cannot hunt traditional prey because in case of injury. Finally, Bijli and her cubs lost interest and lumbered off into the undergrowth.
Much more dangerous than tigers are bears. Upadhyay writes about walking along a forest path with a villager and her child, when a sloth bear appears. They clamber up a tree and some villagers come by to rescue them.
Aside from the narration, it is Shovna Upadhyay’s photographs and water colours that stand out. She says, “Wildlife photography taught me patience and respect for the natural world. Spending long hours in the jungle made me understand animal behaviour first-hand.”
Over the years, she followed her passion and started writing wildlife books for children that are suitable for adults as well. Young minds, when made to care about wildlife by reading books can infect adults as well with their passion. Children then grow up to become wildlife biologists, veterinarians, conservationists, photographers or even writers.
Whatever Upadhayay cannot evoke through her photographs and text, she conveys through poetry, and by doing so she ventures beyond just information to appeal to readers at an emotional level — reviving humankind’s evolutionary coexistence with nature and wildlife.
Male tigers are solitary, and an earlier generation of writers and fables have perpetuated the myth that they are inherently dangerous predators. Royal tiger hunts have glorified the brutality inflicted on the animals.
But having looked at tigers right in their eyes, Upadhyay describes them as an important element of the jungle ecology. Being on top of the food chain, the wellbeing of tiger populations is a barometer for the health of nature itself, and protecting tigers protects its ecosystem.
Upadhayay has an easy-going writing style, there is no overdramatising her adventures, she is just there as our eye witness to the natural world. She pays tribute to nature guides at national parks in India and Nepal, and the dedication and the importance they attach to their profession.
Upadhyay is hopeful that the book will help youngsters to see animals and nature in a different light. She says, “I want children to develop compassion and respect for wildlife. That animals are not separate from us, they are our co-inhabitants on this one earth. Just as we need space to live and thrive, so do they.”
Our Jungles, My Stories
Shovna Upadhyay (Author and Publisher)
2026
Rs1,250