The great variation in eco-geography harbours thousands of floral species and ultimately their affiliated animal species. Apparently, almost all groups of fauna flourish well in this south Asian peninsular region. So as around 70,000 species of the insects.

This publication attributes to the biodiversity and biosystematics of various insect groups found in India. lnsecta as a whole and in parts of it such as order Coleoptera, Diptera, Hemiptera, Hymenoptera, lsoptera and Odonata, are well dealt with. Many authorities have made their contributions in imparting an overview of the insect fauna of the country and others have attributed for their specified regions or of various states.

The publications presented in this volume can be listed as: Diversity of Indian beetle fauna presented by Dr. Pal, T. K. He has reviewed order Coleoptera enlisting 17,036 beetle records from India, and has made an overwhelming comparison with the Global record. Dr. Narendran, T. C. has explored the Oriental species of genus Perliampus (Hymenoptera). He has added 9 species of the genus new to the world record and has subsequently presented an identification key for the 27 oriental species. Dr. Gupta, R. K. has presented An overview of Bees of India detailing diversity of 60 genera with 633 species of bees recorded so far from modern Indian territories. Dr. Parui, P., Dr. D. Banerjee and Dr. B. Mitra have reported 141 genera of aquatic Diptera found in India in their fascinating publication. Biosystematic revision of the carpenter bees of Indian region has been illustrated by Dr. Gupta, R. K. and Dr. D. Yanega. They have explained a taxonomic overview consisting of 45 species and subspecies of the genus Xylocopa found in Indian region. These works specifically refer to the oriental region, South Asian region or for the country as a whole.

In addition to these, several renowned authorities have reflected their expertise in the contributions made for the specific states/regions. Worth mentioning in this regard are: Insect biodiversity in the states of Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh (by Dr. Chandra, K.); Dung beetles of India with special reference of Arunachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Gujrat and Rajasthan (by Dr. Sevak, R.); A systematic database of the Odonata of Kerala (by Dr. Radhakrishnan, C. and Dr. K. G. Emiliyamma);

Insect biodiversity in the lakes of Ladakh region (by Dr. Maheshwari, G. and Dr. G. Maheshwari); Termite check list for the state of Rajasthan (by Dr. Rathore, N. S. and Dr. A. K. Bhattacharyya); A synoptic list of Gerromorpha (Heteroptera) of the Kerala state (by Dr. Thirumalai, G., Dr. C. Radhakrishnan„and Dr. R. Suresh Kumar); Bioindicator species of Chironomidae (Diptera) of high altitude lakes of , Himalaya, India (by Dr. Maheshwari, G. and Dr. G. Maheshwari) and, Ants of the arid zone of Rajasthan (by Dr. Tak, N.).

This book further presents two very special publications. The first one is by Dr. Raven, S. A. detailing about Use of remote sensing and GIS in biodiversity conservation and planning and, the second is from Dr. Tyagi, B. K. concerning Cutaneous leishmaniasis in the Thar Desert.