IWN Daily Digest — Tuesday, 6 October 2026

An Indian-born cheetah at Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh’s Sheopur district has given birth to five cubs, taking India’s cheetah count to 60 and adding a new genetic lineage to the population, since the cubs’ father is a cheetah brought from Botswana.

As reported by DT Next, carrying PTI copy:

“An Indian-born cheetah has given birth to five cubs in Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh’s Sheopur district, taking the total number of the big cats in the country to 60, Chief Minister Mohan Yadav said on Monday. The father is a cheetah brought from Botswana and the birth of these cubs marks the beginning of the Botswana lineage in India, adding a new genetic lineage to the country’s growing cheetah population, a government statement said.”

The mother is KJP21, a female born in India, and she is the third Indian-born female to give birth after Mukhi and KGP12. Business Today put her age at 32 months. Of the 60 cheetahs now in the country, 41 were born on Indian soil, according to the chief minister.

The Union Environment Minister, Bhupender Yadav, also shared the news on X, according to Business Today, and thanked the veterinarians, field staff and managers of Project Cheetah for their work.

Business Today traces how the population got here: eight cheetahs came from Namibia in September 2022, 12 from South Africa in February 2023, and nine from Botswana in February 2026, six of them females and three males. It also reports that in April 2026 KGP12 gave birth to four cubs at Kuno, which it describes as the first recorded birth in the wild since the reintroduction began.

Sources: DT Next (PTI) · Deccan Herald · Business Today

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