Twelve cheetahs—seven males and five females—flown from South Africa arrives at Gwalior, Madhya Pradesh on Saturday. The cheetahs will be released into quarantine enclosures at the Kuno National Park (KNP) in Sheopur district.
This is the second set of big cats arriving at KNP, the first set of eight was released on September 17 last year at an event by Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
They arrived at the Gwalior air base around 10 am. They will reach the Park by noon in IAF helicopter.
According to an expert they will be put into quarantine bomas (enclosures) after half an hour (12.30 pm). The cheetahs will be released into the KNP by chief minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan and Union Minister Bhupender Yadav.
We have set up 10 quarantine bomas for the South African cheetahs, said KNP director Uttam Sharma.
Last year, the delegation from South Africa visited the Park to see the arrangements for housing the big cats at the wildlife sanctuary. In two of these facilities, two pairs of cheetahs would be kept.
A Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) was signed between India and South Africa last month for the translocation of the mammals. In August last year, India had decided to airlift these South African cheetahs.
Eight cheetahs from Namibia—five females and three males—are currently in hunting enclosures at the park before their full release into the wild.
As per Indian wildlife law, a month-long quarantine is mandatory before importing animals and they are required to be kept in isolation for another 30 days after arrival in the country.
The last cheetah died in India in Koriya district of Chhattisgarh in 1947 and the species was declared extinct in 1952. Former Union environment minister Jairam Ramesh had initiated 'Project Cheetah' in 2009 under the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government with an aim to reintroduce the wild cats in India.
(With PTI inputs)
