A range of events including bird watching, heritage walks, hiking, discussions, performance by Austrian violinist Robert Kres and readings by noted actor Tom Alter will be held as part of the two-day Rajpur Nature Festival to be inaugurated here on November 1.

Chief Secretary N Ravishankar will formally inaugurate this festival, which will be organised by the Eco-Tourism wing of the State Forest Department and The Rajpur Community Initiative at the Christian Retreat and Study Centre.

The activities in the festival, which aimed at celebrating the ecological and cultural heritage, will begin on Saturday morning with bird watching led by experts Dhananjai Mohan, Suniti Datta and Raman Kumar followed by a heritage walk led by REACH founder lokesh Ohri from Rajpur post office to Shahenshahi Chowk.

later, Chief Wildlife Warden DVS Khati will lead a group on hiking from Shahenshahi Chowk to Jharipani, followed by opening of food stalls at Shahenshahi Chowk and CRSC lawns, a heritage walk, a butterfly walk led by Sanjay Sondhi of Titli Trust, an exhibition on the biodiversity and built heritage of Rajpur and Dehradun followed by a workshop on environmental conservation.

The afternoon activities will begin with presentations on the conservation of cultural heritage, a drama, Tibetan musical performance by Zhidey Khangsar and gypsy jazz and more by Austrian violinist Robert Kres in the evening.

The activities slated to be held on Sunday include bird watching, heritage walk led by Tom Alter to the Suri Devi temple in the Sal forest, hiking, butterfly walk, presentations on birds, book readings by Stephen Alter and Tom Alter, screening of Hill, Vale and Many a Tale narrated by Tom Alter, recitation of Hindi and Urdu poetry on birds by Tom Alter and destination level consultation on promotion of ecotourism in Dehradun and Uttarakhand with State Forest minister Dinesh Aggarwal as the chief guest.