Shekar Dattatri is a pioneer of wildlife and conservation filmmaking in India, having started his filmmaking journey in 1983. His meticulously crafted 'blue chip' natural history films for international television channels such as National Geographic and Discovery have entertained, inspired and informed people around the world, while his hard hitting conservation films have helped bring about tangible change in India.
He has officiated on the final juries of several prestigious wildlife and environmental film festivals, including Wildscreen, UK (2008 and 2020 editions), the Sondrio Film Festival on Parks and Protected Areas, Italy (2008 edition), the Japan Wildlife Film Festival (2007 edition), and the Vatavaran Wildlife and Environment Film Festival, India. Wildlife photo competition juries he has officiated on include the 'Wildlife Photographer of the Year' competition, conducted by the Natural History Museum, London (2020 edition), the Sanctuary Asia Wildlife Photography Awards (several editions), and Nature in Focus.
In 1991, thanks to an Inlaks Scholarship, Shekar spent eight months working with Oxford Scientific Films in the UK, at the time one the most innovative producers of natural history and science programmes for television. This stint, as well as his award-winning track record, helped him gain a foothold in the exclusive club of international natural history filmmakers. In 1998, the UK trade magazine, Television Business International, rated Shekar as one of the top ten rising stars of wildlife filmmaking in the world.
In 2004 he won a Rolex Award for Enterprise (Switzerland), for his work in conservation filmmaking, and in 2008, the Edberg Award, conferred by the Rolf Edberg Foundation in Sweden.
One of his advocacy films, ‘Mindless Mining – The Tragedy of Kudremukh’ (2001), played a pivotal role in putting an end to a vast iron-ore mining operation within a rainforest National Park in India's Western Ghats.
Shekar’s lifelong fascination with nature began at the age of 10, when he discovered natural history literature. In 1976, aged 13, he joined the famous Madras Snake Park as a student-volunteer and pursued herpetology for the next nine years, becoming adept not only at handling reptiles, but also caring for and breeding them in captivity. Frequent snake hunting trips with members of the Irula tribe in the scrublands and crop fields outside Chennai city inculcated in him a deep admiration for traditional forms of knowledge. In 1982, he assisted Snake Park founder and director, Romulus Whitaker, in setting up a self-help cooperative society for Irula snake catchers to enable them to make a living by legally catching snakes for their venom rather than by illegally killing them for their skins.
An avid photographer, he was able to make a smooth transition to documentary filmmaking when the opportunity arose with 'Snakebite', a dramatised documentary for which he served as Assistant Director. His first film as Director and Cameraman, ‘A Cooperative for Snake Catchers’, won a 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, with the latter also earning him the award for Best Cinematography in the documentary section.
‘Silent Valley', completed in 1991, was the first full length natural history film ever made on the wet evergreen shola forest ecosystem of the Western Ghats. It also won several international awards, including a Special Jury Award at the first Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival in America, a top honor at the Sondrio International Film Festival on Parks and Protected Areas in Italy, and Best Nature Film Award at the Tokyo Earthvision Festival.
Subsequently, Shekar worked with some of the world’s leading natural history broadcasters and production houses, including Channel 4, UK, the Discovery Channel, National Geographic Television, the BBC Natural History Unit, Natural History New Zealand and Icon Films. Some of his films as a cameraman and/or Producer include, The 'Wild India' series (Channel 4, UK; freelance wildlife cameraman), ‘The Good Snake’ (National Geographic Television, Producer and Cameraman), ‘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’ (Part of the 'Wild Asia' Series by Discovery, NHK and NHNZ; Producer and cameraman).
In 2000, despite being at the peak of his international career, Shekar decided to shift focus from making 'pretty films' for television to producing hard-hitting conservation and advocacy films in collaboration with conservation NGOs. Since then, he has used his skills as a Producer, Director, Cameraman and Writer to make films that aim to bring about tangible change.
From 2007 to 2010 he served as a Member of the National Board for Wildlife, a high level advisory body to the Government of India, and, subsequently, as a Member of the State Board for Wildlife, Tamil Nadu.
In 1986, he founded Trust for Environmental Education, along with the late legal luminary and philanthropist, S. Govind Swaminadhan. In 2010 he co-founded Conservation India, India's most authoritative conservation portal, with the late Ramki Sreenivasan. After Ramki passed away in December 2022, Shekar has transitioned into the role of an informal advisor to CI.
He is a passionate speaker on conservation and conservation filmmaking, and has guest lectured at several institutions including National Centre for Biological Sciences, Bengaluru, Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun, and Lal Bahadur Shastri Academy, Mussoorie.
In 2024 he co-taught a J-Term course for New York University Abu Dhabi (NYUAD).
He lives in south India, and can be contacted through email.
