ABOUT THE MILLENNIUM FELLOWSHIP - CLASS OF 2024
United Nations Academic Impact and MCN are proud to partner on the Millennium Fellowship. This year, 52,000+ young leaders applied to join the Class of 2024 on 6,000+ campuses across 170 nations. 280+ campuses worldwide (just 5%) were selected to host the 4,000+ Millennium Fellows.
UNITED NATIONS ACADEMIC IMPACT AND MCN PROUDLY PRESENT BUDHADITYA GHOSH, A MILLENNIUM FELLOW FOR THE CLASS OF 2024.
West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences | Kolkata, India | Advancing SDG 15, SDG 11, SDG 9, SDG 16 & UNAI 9
" "Humans change the world around us in many ways. It is both the blessing and the curse of being a thinking being: the ability to reshape the world. However, even as we move forward and develop as people and as communities, we must take care and have compassion for what we leave in our wake. The past products of our needs and curiosities cannot be abandoned by the wayside, especially when they are living and sentient beings. The de-domestication of the pigeon population has today come back to affect us in many ways, and the only way forward is by taking accountability for their present state and working towards bettering their lot. Through this, maybe we can also better ours." "
Millennium Fellowship Project: The Dovecote Project: A Pigeon Rehabilitation Initiative
The Dovecote Project is a re-domestication project targeting the urban feral pigeon population by introducing policies and infrastructure that reduce human-animal conflict, ensure animal health, and encourage re-adoption of the pigeon as a domestic companion and pet.
The core of the Dovecote Project is a system of low-cost communal lofts erected in a data-driven approach near roosting hotspots so as to provide safe and accessible points of contact and refuge, enabling diet monitoring, health and hygiene tracking, population surveillance, and analytical management.
The long-term goals of the project also include phased and sensitive feral population control, working with municipal administrations and civic bodies to enact policies that reduce political and socio-economic hazards to urban ecosystem balance, and minimum-harm deterrence and removal of unregulated wild nesting zones.
The best-case vision of the project is a complete elimination of the feral pigeon population through re-domestication and the encouragement of adoption and responsible breeding, as well as the creation of infrastructure and policies facilitating the same.
About the Millennium Fellow
Budhaditya Ghosh is a student and aspiring author based out of Kolkata, India and pursuing an undergraduate degree in law from the National University of Juridical Sciences. A consummate Bengali, he has spent time in fierce debate and discussion over everything socio-political since childhood, carrying forward that passion into his career track. Through his project, Budhaditya aims to draw attention to human accountability in the rise of the feral pigeon population worldwide and develop effective and humane methods for their rehabilitation. After he graduates, he plans to pursue litigation that serves the needs of the marginalized sections of society.
