Why in news?

• In Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh another Cheetah (a six-year-old male), translocated from South Africa in February, died recently.
• This is the second cheetah death in Kuno after the translocation of the big cats from Namibia and South Africa to India that started in September 2022.
  • In March, a Namibian cheetah named Sasha had died of kidney complications.

What’s in today’s article?

• Project Cheetah
• News Summary

What is Project Cheetah?

• It is the proposal to reintroduce cheetahs to its former habitat in India.
• The aim of the project has been to reintroduce the feline species in India after they were declared extinct in 1952.
• Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh has been selected as the most suitable site for Cheetah reintroduction under the project.
  • In September 2022, PM Modi released a coalition of cheetahs into the Kuno National Park.
    • Eight cheetahs, five of which are female, were flown from Windhoek, Namibia, to Gwalior.
    • It was the first intercontinental transfer of wild cats into India since independence.
  • Later, in February 2023, 12 South African cheetahs were released into enclosures inside Kuno National Park.
• Discussions to bring the Cheetah back to India were initiated in 2009 by the Wildlife Trust of India.
  • Under the ‘Action Plan for Reintroduction of Cheetah in India’, 50 cheetahs will be brought from African countries to various national parks over 5 years.

News Summary: Cheetah death at Kuno National Park

Were these unfortunate cheetah deaths unexpected?

• Cheetah Project anticipated high mortality
  • The Cheetah Project did anticipate high mortality.
  • The criteria for the project’s short-term success was only 50% survival of the introduced cheetah for the first year. That would be 10 out of 20.
• Project overestimated Kuno’s carrying capacity for cheetahs
  • The project came under pressure after a number of experts pointed out that it had overestimated Kuno’s carrying capacity for cheetahs.
  • Hence, the Madhya Pradesh government set a six-month deadline for readying Gandhisagar — in the Chambal river valley in Mandsaur and Nimach districts — for the cheetahs.
  • There is also talk about moving a few animals from Kuno to the safety of an 80-sq-km fenced area in Rajasthan’s Mukundra Hills Tiger Reserve.
• Shifting goalposts
  • The project’s stated purpose was that of establishing the cheetah in an open landscape as a free-roaming and self-sustaining population occupying thousands of square miles.
  • However, it seems that the focus is shifting to managing the African imports as a few pocket populations in fenced-in or restricted areas.

Is shifting the goalpost a viable step?

• In the absence of natural dispersal, managing a meta-population involves moving suitable individuals from one pocket population to another to maintain genetic viability.
• In 2018, a study documented how meta-population management conserved a declining population of 217 cheetahs in 40 small populations in South Africa.

How do cheetahs die?

• The South African study documented the causes of mortality, where it could be established, for 293 cheetah deaths.
• Deaths attributed to handling and management
  • Almost 15%, one in every seven, cheetah deaths were attributed to handling and management.
  • It included deaths due to holding camps, immobilisation/ transit and due to tracking devices.
• Predation - the biggest killer
  • Predation accounting for 53.2% of cheetah mortality.
  • Lions, leopards, hyenas, and jackals were primarily responsible.
  • It is well documented that cheetahs suffer very high cubs mortality — up to 90% in protected areas — mainly due to predation.

What options are available to the Cheetah project now?

• The Cheetah Project can choose to cut the risk by settling for the South African model of retaining a few pocket populations in fenced-in reserves.
• Also, the project has to find a way for people and cheetahs to share space in the central Indian landscape.
• In the long run, the success of the cheetah project will be determined within the framework of India’s traditional conservation ethos.
  • India’s traditional conservation ethos envisages protecting naturally dispersing wildlife in viable non-fragmented habitats.