'Due To Natural Causes': Centre On Deaths Of Cheetahs At MP's Kuno National Park

To date, five out of the 20 adult cheetahs brought from Namibia and South Africa to the Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh have died.

New Delhi: The Centre on Sunday said that five out of the 20 adult cheetahs brought from Namibia and South Africa to the Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh died due to 'natural causes' and rejected media reports attributing the deaths to factors like radio collars. 

"As per the preliminary analysis by National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), the apex body entrusted with the implementation of Project Cheetah, all mortalities are due to natural causes," the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change said in an official statement.

"There are reports in the media attributing these cheetah deaths to other reasons including their radio collars etc. Such reports are not based on any scientific evidence but are speculation and hearsay," the statement added.

Male cheetah Suraj, translocated from South Africa, died at the Kuno National Park on Friday, while another translocated male cheetah Tejas died on Tuesday.

The ministry also said that the Project Cheetah is yet to complete a year and it will be 'premature' to conclude the outcome in terms of success and failure since cheetah reintroduction is a long-term project. 

"In the last 10 months, all stakeholders involved in this project have gained valuable insights into cheetah management, monitoring, and protection. There is optimism that the project will succeed in the long run and there is no reason to speculate at this juncture," the ministry stated.

It said that for investigating the cause of cheetah deaths, consultation with international cheetah experts and veterinary doctors from South Africa and Namibia is being done on a regular basis. 

"The Cheetah Project Steering Committee is closely monitoring the project and has expressed satisfaction over its implementation so far," the statement read.

Further, the ministry informed that steps like the establishment of a Cheetah Research Center with facilities for rescue, rehabilitation, capacity building, and interpretation; bringing additional forest area under the administrative control of Kuno National Park for landscape level management; providing additional frontline staff; establishing Cheetah Protection Force; and creation of a second home for cheetahs in Gandhi Sagar Wildlife Sanctuary, Madhya Pradesh have been envisaged.

Project Cheetah 'bound to undergo ups and downs'

The ministry said that cheetah has been brought back to India after seven decades and a project of such a stature is 'bound to undergo ups and downs'. 

"Global experience particularly from South Africa suggests that in the initial phase of reintroduction of cheetah in African countries has resulted in more than 50% mortality of introduced cheetahs," it said. 

The mortality of cheetah may happen due to intra-species fights, diseases, and accidents before release and post-release, the ministry said and added that mortalities might also result from injury caused during the hunting of prey, poaching, road hits, poisoning, and predatory attack by other predators, etc. 

All about Modi govt's Project Cheetah

The Narendra Modi-led Government at the Centre has launched the ambitious project of bringing back cheetahs to India. The Project Cheetah is being implemented by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), a statutory body under the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) in collaboration with the Madhya Pradesh Forest Department, Wildlife Institute of India (WII) and cheetah experts from Namibia and South Africa. 

The project implementation is being done as per the 'Action Plan for Introduction in India' and a Steering Committee comprising eminent experts and officials involved in the first-ever successful tiger reintroduction in Sariska and Panna Tiger Reserve, to oversee the project has also been constituted.

Under the project, a total of 20 radio-collared cheetahs were brought from Namibia and South Africa to Kuno National Park, in a first-ever transcontinental wild to wild translocation. After the mandatory quarantine period, all cheetahs were shifted to larger acclimatization enclosures. 

Currently, 11 cheetahs are under free-ranging conditions, while five animals, including a cub born on Indian soil, are within quarantine enclosures.