Apoorva Joshi, Ph.D.

A Saturday afternoon on the streets of Pune in the western Indian state of Maharashtra. 

The khatta meetha Chaat on Pune's streets, a local delicacy.

A local Pune vegetable vendor sits at his road-side "stall" selling Spinach and Mint, wearing a traditional Gandhi topi.

Fresh bunches of mint and spinach on sale at a roadside in Pune.

Fresh washed mint leaves, locally called Pudeena or Pudina.

Colourful chappals and sandals on sale in Pune on a roadside - one of the components of a myriad of colours and sights. 

Hand-made shimmering shiny chakras or wheels that spin with the breeze, on sale at Lakshmi Road, Pune.

A little hand cart with bangles of nearly every shade and combination, in glass and metal. Take your pick. 

The quintessential cup of tea or chaai in traditional local glasses. The irreplaceable flavor or freshly brewed tea with ginger, cardamom and lemon grass.  

Getting stuck in traffic on Prabhat Road in Pune on a sunny afternoon.

Saturday afternoon on Lakshmi Road is only second to Sunday when it comes to choked up streets. You have to be really lucky to find parking space for your scooter and your eye-hand-feet coordination has to be top notch.

Chudidaars and Salwaar Kameez dresses on display in a shop's window on Lakshmi Road, Pune.

A variety of local and not-so-local fruits on sale on the roadsides - an extremely common sight in India. Don't miss the weighing scale in between all the figs, Chikkus, apples and oranges.

If you don't know where you're going, chances are you'll end up wherever the crowd is moving to. This is no place for a relaxed stroll. Power walk mode on.

The red-yellow Pune Municipal Transportation (PMT) buses that ferry citizens across this ever-expanding city of 8 to 9 million people. They may look shabby but are the most trusted mode of transportation for thousands. 

The Marigold flower in its bright orange bloom, locally known as Jhendu in Marathi and Genda in Hindi.

The pink variety of what is called the Temple Flower, at a hotel in the buffer zone of the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve in central India.

Blossoming temple flowers on a bright sunny day in the village of Moharli in rural central India.

A large tree with 4 massive beehives on a hot Moharli afternoon in the Forest Colony.

Students who attend Moharli's Zilla Parishad School (government school), sweep the entrance and clear the dust in a symbolic tradition of keeping one's temple of wisdom clean. Once done sweeping, they join the rest of their school mates in prayer and a general knowledge Q n A before heading to class.

A common sight in India's many pockets of wilderness, the Indian or Blue Roller, sits pretty on a branch in the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve.

Inside the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve, we wait patiently near one of these signs for some wild animal movement. 

An adult Nilgai or "Blue Bull" in the fields of the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve. Although called "bull" the Nilgai is actually a member of the Antelope family.

On our very first safari, we were greeted by the Jaamni-waali tigress as the reserve guides call her. Lazing around in the afternoon heat, she moved for just a few second to check on an annoying fly and for the most part, was entirely indifferent to our presence. 

Herders bring their livestock home on the flaky cement road that leads to Moharli, a village of approximately 1200 people in central India. Moharli sits on the cusp of tiger tourism as it lies on the border of the core-buffer zones of the Tadoba-Andhari Tiger Reserve.