12 cheetahs to be flown in from South Africa on February 18

Twelve cheetahs are set to arrive in India from South Africa on February 18 as part of the country’s ambitious Cheetah reintroduction programme. The announcement was made by Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav on Thursday, after India signed an MoU with South Africa in January to transport cheetahs and reintroduce them into the wild.

The first batch of eight spotted felines, five females and three males, were released from Namibia into a quarantine enclosure at the Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh last year. Currently, the eight cheetahs are in good health, killing a prey every three to four days. One of the cheetahs had been unwell, but has since recovered after receiving treatment.

India’s Cheetah reintroduction programme aims to bring back the species, which was wiped out from India due to overhunting and habitat loss, and has not been seen in the country since the last spotted feline died in 1948. The cheetah is the only large carnivore that has gone extinct in India.

The ‘Action Plan for Reintroduction of Cheetah in India’, prepared by the Wildlife Institute of India, states that around 12-14 wild cheetahs will be imported from South Africa, Namibia and other African countries to establish a new cheetah population in India. This will be done as a founder stock for five years initially and then as required by the programme.

Following the import of the 12 cheetahs in February, the plan is to translocate a further 12 annually for the next eight to 10 years. The terms of the MoU will be reviewed every five years to ensure it remains relevant. While a majority of the world’s 7,000 cheetahs live in South Africa, Namibia and Botswana, Namibia has the world’s largest population of cheetahs.

(PTI inputs)

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