Maharashtra forest minister Sudhir Mungantiwar on Tuesday met Bollywood megastar Amitabh Bachchan at his office to discuss the modalities about his role as the state’s tiger ambassador. “Was overwhelmed to see his interest and enthusiasm about forest and tigers. Good days ahead for tigers,” Mr Mungantiwar tweeted. On Monday, Mr Bachchan had accepted Mr Mungantiwar’s proposal to be the tiger ambassador of the state.
The 72-year-old actor had communicated his consent to the minister through a letter. “I wish to accept your kind offer to render my services towards the state government’s initiative for tiger conservation. Kindly treat this letter as my consent to represent the state as tiger ambassador,” Mr Bachchan wrote.
Mr Mungantiwar had said that due to consistent efforts at tiger conservation, the population of tigers, which was 103 in 2006, had increased to 190 in 2014.
Mr Mungantiwar, while chairing the State Tiger Conservation Foundation meeting at Nagpur on July 4, had directed his ministry to approach Mr Bachchan and cricketer Sachin Tendulkar to be the brand ambassadors for the programme.
Accordingly, the ministry wrote a letter to Mr Bachchan on July 29 on the occasion of World Tiger Day and the actor gave a positive response within 11 days.
