Shekar Dattatri

Shekar Dattatri is a conservation filmmaker in India, having started his filmmaking journey in 1983 as Assistant Director on 'Snakebite,' a documentary. His meticulously crafted 'blue chip' films have entertained and inspired people worldwide. Shekar's started his career at 13, once he joined the famous Madras Snake Park as a student-volunteer in 1976. This led him to pursue nature photography and then documentary filmmaking. His 1st film, 'A Cooperative for Snake Catchers,' won the National Award in 1987 for Best Scientific Film. His next two documentaries, 'Seeds of Hope' and 'Silent valley - an Indian Rainforest,' were also National Award winners. 'Silent Valley,' made in 1991, also won many international awards, as well as a blue ribbon jury Award at the first Jackson Hole wildlife film festival in America, a high honor at the Sondrio International film festival on Parks and guarded Areas, and Best Nature Film Award at the Tokyo Earthvision competition.

In 1991, he was awarded an Inlaks Scholarship to work with Oxford Scientific Films for eight months. The ' Wild India Wild India is a series which is directed by Duncan >> Read More... ' series (Channel four, UK; freelance wildlife cameraman), 'The good Snake' (National Geographic tv, Producer and Cameraman) and 'Nagarahole – Tales from an Indian Jungle' (Discovery Channel; Producer, cameraman, and writer), 'Land of the Tiger' (A BBC NHU series; freelance cameraman on four episodes) and 'Monsoon – India's God of Life are some of his works. He has conjointly served on the ultimate juries of many prestigious life and environmental film festivals and photo competitions, as well as the Japan life festival (2007), Wildscreen, United Kingdom (2008 and 2020), the Sondrio competition on Parks and guarded Areas, Italia (2008), Vatavaran life and setting competition, India, Sanctuary Asia life Photography Awards (several editions), Nature centered and life artist of the Year, 2020.

In 1998, the UK trade magazine, Television Business International, included him among the highest ten rising stars of wildlife filmmaking. However, despite being at the height of his international career, Shekar moved from tv documentaries in 2000 to concentrate more on conservation filmmaking. Since operating closely with each government and conservation organization in India, Shekar has been using his skills as a Producer, Director, cameraman, and writer to create films that can make a distinction. One among these, 'Mindless Mining – The Tragedy of Kudremukh' (2001), was about an iron-ore mining operation at intervals in a rainforest park in the Western Ghats in India.

In 2008, he received the Edberg Award, presented by the Rolf Edberg Foundation in Sweden. Besides filmmaking, Shekar jointly writes popular articles on life, conservation and filmmaking. He has written three children's books, 'The Riddle of the Ridley,' 'Lai Lai the Baby Elephant' and 'Ira the little Dolphin.' He lives in Chennai.