This is a continuation of ‘Project Cheetah’ under which eight cheetahs from Namibia were reintroduced to the Indian landscape September 17 last year
On February 16, 2023, Union Minister for Environment, Forest and Climate Change Bhupendar Yadav announced the arrival of 12 South African cheetahs on Indian soil.
This is a continuation of ‘Project Cheetah’ under which eight cheetahs from Namibia were reintroduced to the Indian landscape September 17 last year.
A Memorandum of Understanding was signed January 27 earlier this year between the two governments according to which cheetahs are to be translocated for the next 8-10 years from South Africa to India.
This year, the seven male and five female cheetahs were brought in from the Phinda and Rooiberg Reserves in South Africa.The big cats were translocated from O R Tambo International Airport in Johannesburg on the evening of February 17 to Gwalior by an Indian Air Force Boeing C-17 GlobeMaster.
After the arrival at the Gwalior Air Force base in Madhya Pradesh on the morning of February 18, they were transported to Sheopur near Kuno.
According to the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change, cheetah experts, veterinarians and senior officials will be accompanying the cheetahs for the translocation exercise.
Opinions of experts on the translocation remain divided, as many note that introducing African cheetahs to Indian grasslands will not help conservation as claimed and might interfere with the villages nearby since India does not have fenced national parks like Africa.
While the government assured that all Namibian cheetahs were ‘doing very well’, authorities raised concerns about renal failure in one cheetah — five-year-old Sasha — earlier this year.
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