The film features the plight of tigers living outside tiger reserves and the whole issue of gaps in human and other resources for their protection. It highlights the problems that the forest department personnel face on the ground, and brings up the question of social carrying capacity and the problems faced by the communities living in proximity to the tigers.
Talking about his film Bose said, “The Forgotten Tigers is the first film, which takes a look into the lives of tigers that live outside the tiger reserves and critiques the dominant tiger conservation strategy that the country has been following for four decades.”
With shrinking forests and eroding legal protections, the tigers’ space is being squeezed. While some of the tiger reserves are now legally well protected and safe heavens for the tigers, many tigers are living outside in the mine fields. When the tigers reach carrying capacity populations in a reserve, they by their natural instinct travel to seek new homes. And when they do, they cross over to the unprotected lands and their lives and that of the habitation all around, come into peril, he said.
Commenting on the film Syed Miraz Ahmed an independent journalist, said that Bose’s film has set an example of sorts in the genre of documentary film making that is responsible for bringing core issues of conservation and allied matters to the fore. “It is a subtlety intelligent reportage which calls for more screenings across northeast India. Policy makers need to see this film and environmental activists should lobby against ill planned conservation efforts and the politics encircling it. Documentary film makers of this region has a lot to learn from Bose's experience.”, he said.
Bose is also involved in conducting sessions on environment education in schools and colleges, using his films as a medium. He has been a guest faculty in top media and design schools in India like Symbiosis and National School of Design.
In 2009 Bose was conferred the highest award for documentary filmmaking in the field of Environment and Wildlife in India with the CMS-UNEP Prithvi Ratna Award. The screening ended with an open house that received active participation from among students, the academia and others present.
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