Indian botanist Kamaljit S. Bawa received the prestigious Linnean Medal in Botany from the Linnean Society of London.
He was the President of Bengaluru-based non-profit Ashoka Trust for Research in Ecology and the Environment (ATREE).
Bawa is the first Indian to win the award ever since it was first constituted in 1888.
He is being recognized for his pioneering research on the evolution of tropical plants, tropical deforestation, non-timber forest products and for decades of work on the biodiversity of forests in Central America, the Western Ghats, and the Eastern Himalaya.
His best efforts were seen in establishing the open-access interdisciplinary journal Conservation and in 2003, the online citizen-science repository ‘India Biodiversity Portal’ and ATREE (ranked second in Asia and 18th globally among the world’s environment think tanks)
It is a good recognition of our work on conservation and sustainability.
It is awarded to a biologist every year by the Linnean Society of London.
The world’s oldest active biological society was founded in 1788 and named after famous Swedish biologist Carl Linnaeus who gave us one of the systems of naming plants and animals.
Incidentally, the first scientist to receive the Linnean Medal was Sir Joseph D. Hooker who compiled the monumental seven-volume Flora of British India, the first ever comprehensive account of India’s plants.