Overview
- Chief Minister Mohan Yadav released two female cheetahs into Kuno’s Palpur East Range on Monday, taking the park’s free-ranging total to 17.
- These are the first of nine Botswana cheetahs that arrived on February 28 and moved from quarantine to soft-release enclosures in April, with seven still in bomas under a phased plan.
- Officials are considering whether remaining Botswana cheetahs should be freed at Kuno or shifted to Gandhi Sagar or Nauradehi to build a wider, connected cheetah landscape.
- Post-release tracking uses radio telemetry, and the state has raised compensation for deaths from wildlife attacks to ₹25 lakh alongside a ₹47.11 crore plan for elephant management and conflict mitigation.
- The broader strategy adds wildlife corridors and road underpasses to reduce edge-of-forest clashes, expanding beyond a tiger-first approach after earlier cheetah deaths and boundary excursions prompted a cautious rollout.