Man Inspired by 'Avatar’ Creates a ‘Biosphere’ Connecting The Nearby Land to National Park

Nestled inside a tiger reserve in the Shivalik Mountain Range, the southernmost foothills of the Himalayas, India’s first “biosphere” is teeming with life. About two years back, this 32-acre patch of land was steeped in barrenness. Then came Jai Dhar Gupta, a 52-year-old entrepreneur. When he came across this patch during a trip to Uttarakhand, it popped a light bulb in his brain, and he decided to breathe new life into this barren piece of land. Re-animated, today, this fragment sits in the mountains, carpeted along the undulating hills and ridges of the forest, cradling a menagerie of wild beasts and native trees, according to The Better India.

Gupta worked as a businessman in the US. Back in 2010, he returned to his home city, Delhi. However, within just a short period, the polluted air of Delhi strangled him in its grip. Doctors diagnosed him with a brutal form of asthma. The pain triggered in him a drive to do something about the tainted environment. The visit to Uttarakhand helped him connect the pieces of the puzzle.

He collaborated with one of the most famous rewilding experts in India, Vijay Dhasmana, to transform the barren land. For inspiration, he turned to Hollywood. The fictional world of Pandora, featured in the movie Avatar, had always captured his imagination, and he decided to mimic this world and re-create it on this land. “I’m chasing what we saw in that movie Avatar,” he told the media channel. The real-world Pandora teems with life. It’s like stepping inside The Jungle Book, Gupta exclaimed.