Reimagining people’s participation in the People Biodiversity Register through citizen science – a case of small mammal and bats from the Eastern Himalaya, India

In theory, the mandate of The Biological Diversity Act, 2002 of India for the preparation of People Biodiversity Registers (PBRs) by the Biodiversity Management Committees is a participatory process that involves local communities. In practice, the PBR documentation is a hasty process of meeting deadlines where local communities are restricted to helping researchers in data collection. However, data from our field studies and from the citizen science platform showed immense potential to actively engage local communities in the PBR process. We envision a framework to integrate citizen science and PBR within the ambit of programmes 1 and 7 of the National Mission on Biodiversity and Human Well-Being.