AWARDS & CERTIFICATIONS
Meet Pushpendra Singh, our General Manager at Bandhavgarh Jungle Lodge, a man of few words and who has been the backbone of the Jungle Lodge from over 25 years. He joined our company in 1995 and under the able guidance of the owner Mr. Pradeep Sankhala, learned the ropes of the hospitality industry. With a wealth of experience now he manages the local staff and our lodge as well as personally caters to all guest requirements.
His dedication, integrity and contribution towards the Jungle Lodge is unsurpassable, he is known and respected by one and all in Bandhavgarh. Though he hails from Jaipur, Rajasthan, Bandhavgarh is his home away from home! Today you can catch up with him over a cup of tea and listen to his in numerous stories along with his memories of Bandhavgarh National Park and its world famous tigers! His storytelling will keep you mesmerized, some of the best kept secrets and wild old tales from the past !!!!
Growing up in the midst of the rich Panna forests, Sadhvi’s love for nature comes, well, naturally. Her great grandfather, an army man moved to Panna, Madhya Pradesh, famous for its national park and diamond mines, became the family home.
Armed with a Bachelor’s degree in Tourism Management, and a certified diploma in German from New Delhi, Sadhvi joined as an intern at one of the leading players in the sector of luxury lodges in national parks in India. She trained to be a professional naturalist and appreciating the wildlife of the jungle from a new standpoint. Being adept at her work, she joined the operations team and in close to a decade became familiar with four of the biggest national parks in Madhya Pradesh, including Kanha, Bandhavgarh, Pench and Panna, through her work.
Married in 2016, she came to Bandhavgarh Jungle Lodge where her father-in-law, Pushpendra Singh, was looking after the property that was lovingly set up by Pradeep Sankhala over three decades ago. Fond of interacting with people and exploring the jungle, Sadhvi, encouraged by Amit Sankhala’s vision to spearhead the operations and oversee the family-run jungle lodge of repute, used all her expertise to bring about the changes to include local community participation to an even greater degree than before.
A Chandigarh born, management graduate never knew that his passion will take him out of the concrete jungle to the Central Indian Landscape teeming with wildlife. A journey from being a city kid, to an animal lover, conservationist, a safari guide, and a wildlife photographer who surrender himself to the unraveling mysteries of nature.
It has been six years now here at Bandhavgarh, I don’t know how many tiger sightings I have had, the number of photographs I have clicked but still every time I take guests in the park the level of excitement and curiosity is the same, like when I saw my first tiger in the Wild.
A Microbiologist & Business Management graduate, he has always believed the forests to be his true calling !
He would like his career to involve exploring the forests, giving back to the communities and landscape and introducing people to the treasure that is our natural heritage. With an affinity towards conservation apart from tourism, he has also volunteered his time engaging with children living around the fringes of the forest, talking to them about the biodiversity that exists in their proximity while also exchanging stories & folklore and his love of the forests.
He is a certified instructor by the Madhya Pradesh Eco Development Board & Madhya Pradesh Forest Department for creation and conducting of experiential learning activities for children. He describes his dream job to be introducing people to everything in the wilderness which is not subject to tigers alone . Aniket visited Bandhavgarh for the very first time in 2009 as a tourist and hasn’t looked back since. A self taught naturalist, he has worked towards curating experiences as a destination expert, promoting conservation & community based tourism in the region.
A Smiling face with so much warmth and for that reason, Suresh is someone whom you’d want to meet the most when you’re at the lodge. Officially he heads the housekeeping team, but it would be very unfair if he is called anything less than an all-rounder. From basic maintenance to, storekeeping, to procurement and helping the service team whenever required. Suresh does it all, like a pro.
He is a local and has been working with Bandhavgarh Jungle Lodge for over twenty years, he too joined when the lodge was quite new, without any prior training in hospitality. With the help of lodge management’s effort to train him and his hard work has brought him a very long way, to be the man that he is today, we couldn’t be more proud of him and can’t imagine our team without him.
Meet Lallu – Lallu has been working with Bandhavgarh Jungle Lodge for 22 years and is one of the important pillars of the Jungle Lodge family. He joined when there were hardly any lodges around the National Park and there was obviously no way of getting trained into hospitality. However, one thing always stands out in our staff is “warmth” and the genuineness makes them special.
Lallu has been able to send his daughter to a nearby town to learn the computer and Son goes to an English medium school. Lallu is always there to greet and assist when you come back from Safaris. Have you met him already?
It’s 50 years since Kailash Sankhala took the helm at India’s Project Tiger - and his family wildlife lodge is still doing a roaring trade, finds Tamara Hinson. MTEN minutes into a stroll along Bandhavgarh National Park’s boundary when I start questioning my keenness to see the wildlife. My companion is naturalist Simranjit, whose stories amuse and terrify in equal parts. He chuckles when he realises I mistook the flimsy fence for some kind of barrier.
Alarm calls from monkeys grew increasingly shrill, the shrieks of peacocks ever louder. The jungle was on red alert. Such animal warnings about predators are just what you want to hear if you’re searching for a big cat in India: in this drum roll of agitation, our 4x4 rounded a corner and came to an abrupt halt. In front of us, a tiger had stepped out of the undergrowth.
Poner Singh is a stubborn man. When India’s National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) invited him to swap his hand-to-mouth existence in the teak forests of the Satpura Tiger Reserve for a free house and five acres of farmland on the outside, the father of two declined.
Sankhala is certain I’ll see a tiger. He tells me this as we bump along the dirt roads of Bandhavgarh National Park, India’s tiger country – 1,540km2 of swaying grassland and tropical forest where the mighty Bengal tiger roams freely.
Tamara Hinson heads to Bandhavgarh National Park, one of India’s best conservation success stories, in search of big cats.
From the moment I enter Bandhavgarh National Park, it’s clear the wildlife is never far away.