BharatNotes What is Project Cheetah?
Project Cheetah is India's flagship species-reintroduction programme aimed at re-establishing a free-ranging cheetah population in the country, seven decades after the animal was declared locally extinct. The cheetah was officially declared extinct in India in 1952, with the last individuals believed to have been hunted around 1948. Because the native Asiatic cheetah survives only in critically endangered numbers in Iran, India sourced the closely related African cheetah (Acinonyx jubatus) from Namibia and South Africa.
The programme was formally launched on 17 September 2022, when Prime Minister Narendra Modi released the first eight Namibian cheetahs into quarantine enclosures at Kuno National Park, Madhya Pradesh. It is widely described as the world's first inter-continental translocation of a large wild carnivore.
Key Features
- Implementing agency: National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), under the Ministry of Environment, Forest & Climate Change (MoEFCC), guided by an Action Plan for Introduction of Cheetah in India (2022).
- Primary site: Kuno National Park (Madhya Pradesh), chosen for its grassland-savanna habitat and prey base, following IUCN reintroduction guidelines.
- Objective: Restore the cheetah's functional ecological role in its historical range, strengthen India's grassland and open-forest conservation, and support local livelihoods through eco-development.
Translocation Timeline
| Batch | Source country | Number | Date (as reported) |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | Namibia | 8 (5F, 3M) | 17 September 2022 |
| 2 | South Africa | 12 | February 2023 |
| 3 | Botswana | 9 (6F, 3M) | 28 February 2026 |
Current Status (as of April 2026)
India's cheetah population stood at about 57 in April 2026, with the majority at Kuno National Park and a small number ranging in the Gandhi Sagar Wildlife Sanctuary (Madhya Pradesh), which is being developed as a second home and part of a proposed Kuno–Gandhi Sagar landscape. Major milestones include the first cubs born on Indian soil in 2023 and, in April 2026, the first recorded wild birth by an Indian-born female. The programme has, however, faced criticism over mortalities among both imported adults and India-born cubs, attributed to factors such as kidney/heat-related stress, infections and territorial fighting — fuelling debate over Kuno's carrying capacity and the need to ready additional sites.
UPSC Angle
For Prelims, focus on dates, source countries, Kuno's location, the NTCA/MoEFCC link, and the "first inter-continental large-carnivore translocation" tag. For Mains (GS3), Project Cheetah is a ready case study on the ecological, scientific and ethical dimensions of reintroducing a non-native subspecies, grassland conservation, and balancing conservation optics with sustainable population management. Cross-link with current affairs on Ujiyari.com for the latest population and mortality updates, as these figures change frequently.
