Four South African cheetahs to Bengaluru

Four South African cheetahs to Bengaluru

News –

• Four South African cheetahs—two males and two females—arrived at Kempegowda International Airport in Bengaluru.
• This arrival marks the return of cheetahs to Karnataka after roughly 70 years.

Key Details of the Arrival

• Source & Exchange: The animals were sourced from South Africa’s Induna Primate and Parrot Park as part of a formal exchange programme.
• Quarantine: The cheetahs are undergoing a 30-day quarantine at the Bannerghatta Biological Park (BBP).

About

• India declared the cheetah extinct in 1952, after decades of over-hunting, habitat fragmentation, and depletion of prey species.
• The launch of Project Cheetah in 2022 and the arrival of cheetahs from Namibia and South Africa created the world’s first intercontinental relocation programme for a large carnivore.
• Botswana – It’s a landlocked country with nearly 70% of its landmass covered by the Kalahari Desert, and holds one of the world’s largest wild cheetah populations.

Project Cheetah

• Overview: Project Cheetah is India’s ambitious attempt to reintroduce the cheetah in suitable open forest and grassland ecosystems.
• Launched By: National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA), a statutory body under the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 (amended 2006).
• Uniqueness – It is the world’s first intercontinental translocation of a large wild carnivore.

Translocations So Far:

• 8 cheetahs from Namibia in 2022
• 12 cheetahs from South Africa in 2023
• 8 cheetahs from Botswana (2025 announcement)

Cheetah(Acinonyx jubatus)

• It is the world’s fastest mammal and the only large carnivore to have gone extinct in India (1952).
• Unlike other big cats, cheetahs do not roar.
• There are two main species: the African cheetah (Vulnerable) and the Asiatic cheetah (Critically Endangered), found only in eastern Iran and parts of Africa.​