Mark Roland Shand is a British

British people

The British are citizens of the United Kingdom, of the Isle of Man, any of the Channel Islands, or of any of the British overseas territories, and their descendants...

 travel writer and conservationist.

Shand is the son of Bruce Shand

Bruce Shand

Major Bruce Middleton Hope Shand, MC and bar, DL, was an officer in the British Army. He is best known as the father of Camilla, Duchess of Cornwall, the second wife of Charles, Prince of Wales.-Early life:...

 MC and his wife the Hon Rosalind Maud Cubitt, daughter of the 3rd Baron Ashcombe

Roland Cubitt, 3rd Baron Ashcombe

Roland Calvert Cubitt, 3rd Baron Ashcombe was a member of the British aristocracy. He became Baron Ashcombe on the death of his father Henry Cubitt, 2nd Baron Ashcombe in 1947.-Education and career:...

 and the former Sonia Keppel

Sonia Cubitt, Baroness Ashcombe

Sonia Rosemary Cubitt, Baroness Ashcombe OBE DStJ was the daughter of Hon. George Keppel and his wife, Alice and the grandmother of the Duchess of Cornwall. Violet Trefusis was her sister.On 16 November 1920, she married Hon...

. His elder sister is HRH The Duchess of Cornwall. He was educated at Milton Abbey School. In 1990, he married Clio Goldsmith

Clio Goldsmith

Clio Goldsmith is a French former actress, appearing mostly as Femme fatale, call girl or prostitute in the early 1980s. She is the daughter of ecologist Edward Goldsmith....

, a daughter of Edward Goldsmith

Edward Goldsmith

Edward René David Goldsmith , widely known as Teddy Goldsmith, was an Anglo-French environmentalist, writer and philosopher....

, with whom he has a daughter Ayesha.

He is the author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

 of Travels on My Elephant, River Dog and other books. He has also featured in many documentaries, some related to his writings. Elephants feature in much of his writings and other pursuits. Being an unabashed Indophile, the majority of his writings and TV features are Indo-Nostalgic. He has a deep interest in the Hindu

Hindu

Hindu refers to an identity associated with the philosophical, religious and cultural systems that are indigenous to the Indian subcontinent. As used in the Constitution of India, the word "Hindu" is also attributed to all persons professing any Indian religion...

 religion and traditional Indian culture.

As a BBC

BBC

The British Broadcasting Corporation is a British public service broadcaster. Its headquarters is at Broadcasting House in the City of Westminster, London. It is the largest broadcaster in the world, with about 23,000 staff...

 conservationist

Conservationist

Conservationists are proponents or advocates of conservation. They advocate for the protection of all the species in an ecosystem with a strong focus on the natural environment...

 and travel writer he authored a book and the corresponding BBC documentary Queen of the Elephants

Queen of the Elephants

Queen of the Elephants is a book authored by the conservationist and travel writer Mark Shand and the corresponding BBC documentary Queen of the Elephants, based on the life of the first female mahout in recent times—Parbati Barua of Kaziranga...

, based on the life of the first female mahout in recent times — Parbati Barua

Parbati Barua

Parbati Barua is the first female mahout in recent recorded history, and a citizen of India.Born to Late Prakritish Chandra Barua of the Royal Family Of Gauripur . She came to the limelight after the BBC created the documentary "Queen of the Elephants" based on her life, along with the companion...

 of Kaziranga. The book went on to win the 1996 Thomas Cook Travel Book Award

Thomas Cook Travel Book Award

The Thomas Cook Travel Book Award originated as an initiative of Thomas Cook AG in 1980, with the aim of encouraging and rewarding the art of literary travel writing. The awards stopped in 2005...

 and the Prix Litteraire d'Amis, providing publicity simultaneously to the profession of mahouts, and to Kaziranga.

Conservation Work

Mark Shand is actively involved in the conservation of the Asian elephant and runs a charity called Elephant Family

Elephant Family

Elephant Family exists to save the endangered Asian elephant from extinction in the wild, along with tigers, orang-utans and all the other animals who share their habitat...

.