IWN Daily Digest — Monday, 11 May 2026
Two female cheetahs from Botswana were released into the open wilderness of Kuno National Park today as Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav visited the reserve in Sheopur district. The two animals, part of a batch of nine cheetahs airlifted from Botswana to India in February 2026 with Indian Air Force support, had been completing their acclimatisation in soft-release enclosures at Kuno before today’s transition to open forest. The release brings the total number of cheetahs under Project Cheetah to 57 — a figure that includes four cubs born at Kuno in April 2026.
The Mother’s Day timing was deliberate. Kuno marked the occasion by releasing footage of cheetah Veera — a South Africa-origin female who arrived at the park in February 2023 — caring for and playing with her two cubs, a quiet illustration of what successful acclimatisation looks like after years of early setbacks.
The numbers from Kuno have improved steadily. Nine cheetahs from Botswana joined the project in February this year, following the original eight from Namibia (September 2022) and twelve from South Africa (February 2023). Two animals were transferred to Gandhi Sagar Wildlife Sanctuary in Mandsaur district in April 2025. The project has had documented deaths, and wildlife experts are measured about what 57 animals actually means for long-term viability — territory management, prey base, disease surveillance, and genetic diversity all remain live questions. But the direction of travel is positive, and today’s release continues it.
Beyond the cheetah count
The release at Kuno sits within a broader shift in how Madhya Pradesh is approaching wildlife governance. The state has been known for decades as India’s Tiger State — and justifiably, with the highest tiger count in the country. Over the past 18 months, it has been building a wider architecture around that reputation.
Two new tiger reserves have been added: Ratapani, declared in 2024 as the state’s eighth, and Madhav National Park, declared in 2025 as its ninth. Gandhi Sagar and Nauradehi are being developed as future cheetah habitats beyond Kuno. A new wildlife sanctuary named after Dr. Bhimrao Ambedkar was created in 2025, bringing the state’s total to 25 sanctuaries. The state cabinet has approved a ₹47 crore plan for wild elephant management and human-elephant conflict mitigation, covering surveillance, rapid-response systems, and community-facing interventions.
The compensation figure for deaths caused by wildlife attacks has been raised from ₹8 lakh to ₹25 lakh — a meaningful policy signal, as IWN has reported, in landscapes where conservation’s long-term success depends on the confidence of communities who bear its costs.
A vulture that flew to Central Asia
One of the less-reported threads in Madhya Pradesh’s conservation story is its vulture programme. A cinereous vulture rescued in Vidisha district in December 2025, treated at the Kerwa Vulture Conservation Breeding Centre near Bhopal — operated jointly by Van Vihar National Park and the Bombay Natural History Society — was released at Halali Dam in February 2026. It subsequently flew thousands of kilometres toward Central Asia, tracked via satellite. The Kerwa centre is one of a small number of active vulture breeding facilities in India, and the successful rehabilitation and long-distance flight of this bird is the kind of conservation outcome that rarely generates headlines outside specialist circles.
The harder question
The challenge for Madhya Pradesh, as wildlife experts note, is whether momentum can be translated into durable governance. Adding reserves and raising compensation figures are the easier parts. Managing wildlife corridors so that animals can move safely between the expanding network of protected areas — before highways and settlement patterns cut them permanently — is the harder, slower work. Building community confidence in landscapes where the forest edge is a place of genuine daily risk requires consistency and funding that political cycles tend not to sustain.
Kuno is today the most visible face of India’s wildlife ambitions. What happens in the decades after the cameras leave will determine whether it is remembered as a landmark or a lesson.
Sources: Free Press Journal — Cheetah tally reaches 57, MP expands wildlife push, 10 May 2026 · New Kerala — CM Yadav releases two cheetahs at Kuno, 11 May 2026 · Oneindia — MP wildlife governance expansion, 10 May 2026 · PIB — Nine cheetahs from Botswana arrive at Kuno, February 2026
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