India prepares to welcome 12 African cheetahs

BBC reported that a dozen African cheetahs are set to arrive in India, months after eight of the big cats were transferred from neighboring Namibia last year.

Five females and seven males will be flown from South Africa to a national park in central India on Saturday.The transfer is part of an agreement signed by South Africa in January to introduce dozens of cheetahs to India over the next decade.

Asiatic cheetahs became extinct in India in the late 1940s and experts say that excessive hunting and loss of habitat led to their disappearance.

In 2020, India’s Supreme Court had ruled that African cheetahs, a different subspecies, could be brought into the country at a “carefully chosen location” on an experimental basis.In 2022, eight cheetahs were transported from Namibia to the Kuno National Park in the central Indian state of Madhya Pradesh. Now 12 more big cats will join those introduced from Namibia.