The Remarkable Life and Work of Salim Ali

The story of the great scientist, who inspired three generations of Indian naturalists

- J. C. Daniel

I watched the heaving monsoon seas, with a sinking heart. Being tossed about in a narrow dug-out canoe was not something I’d bargained for when I joined the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS), a few months earlier. As one of my legs began to twitch uncontrollably, the tiny bearded man sitting next to me asked, “Can you swim Daniel?” “Swim? Y-yes,” I stammered wondering wildly if Salim Ali, the legendary honorary secretary of the BNHS was about to give the order to abandon ship. Instead, Salim Ali looked at me for a moment and said quietly, “I can’t.” His calm words immediately banished much of my fear, and from then on, I learnt not only to cope with harsh surroundings, but to savour every minute, as a true naturalist should.

That was the kind of effect Salim Moizuddin Abdul Ali had on you. To the world he was amazingly versatile—ornithologist, explorer, ecologist, teacher, writer. But to all of us at the BNHS with which he was associated for 80 of his 91 years, this bright-eyed, sparrow-like figure was an all-knowing father, the person we refer to as the Old Man. And, like a father, he dazzled us with his achievements,

Taking up ornithology at a time when the subject in India was little more than an Englishman’s pastime, Salim Ali made it a serious pursuit. He studied the birds of nearly every region of the subcontinent and wrote with such wit and elegance that he was included in an anthology entitled Indian Masters of English, along with Rabindranath Tagore and Sarojini Naidu.