Senior journalist Peter Jackson passes away

Senior journalist Mr. Peter Jackson, who was a close friend of former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi, passed away in London last night. He was 90.

Mr. Jackson was also the founder of the "Project Tiger in India".

Through a long and eventful life, he was a journalist, naturalist, photographer, conservationist and a cat specialist. He was probably among the most knowledgeable experts on wild cats in the world.

Deeply concerned, but not over-sentimental about the tiger, Jackson devoted and dedicated a vast proportion of his life to its protection.

He and his wife Adrienne Farrell Jackson both had a passion for India's wildlife.

He was a recipient of the Second International Salim Ali Award for Conservation from the Bombay Natural History Society (BNHS) and the Peter Scott Award for Conservation Merit by the IUCN Species Survival Commission.

He was also instrumental in establishing the Sultan Bird Sanctuary in Haryana and actively associated with the WWF, the Wildlife Institute of India, the Indian Institute of Science and the International Union for Conservation of Nature and Natural Resources (IUCN), the last, an international organisation working in the field of nature conservation.

Mr. Jackson was in charge of the Reuters bureau in India as chief correspondent twice - once between 1954 and 1960 and again from 1962 to 1970.