Gajner, Rajasthan:
The cheetah is an animal that can streak across the canvas of grassland like quicksilver, an animal that was tamed during the Mughal period as a hunting mate for the royals, an animal that took the fancy of hunters and was last spotted in the Sal forests of Madhya Pradesh in 1962.
India's conservationists are still battling the collective guilt of losing the cheetah, the only animal to have become extinct in independent India. In this context, plans to reintroduce the cheetah have been met with enthusiasm by wildlife experts who believe it's time to recover India's lost ecological heritage.
The environment minister Jairam Ramesh is one of those who personally believe it's time to bring back the cheetah and that perhaps prompted his statement in Lok Sabha in the last session, where he talked about the need to reintroduce the fastest animal on the planet in India.
That statement was met with skepticism, chiefly by the tiger lobby which has its hands full battling the tiger crisis. Over the last few years, media coverage has largely focused on the need to save India's tigers with story after story on how we are losing our tigers to poachers and poor forest management. NDTV has also been actively campaigning to 'Save the Tiger' because it is our national pride, an animal whose presence connotes that all is well with our eco-system. Despite that, this year alone, we have lost over 60 tigers and many of our tiger reserves are in danger of losing their existing big cat populations.
At such a juncture, is it viable to think of reintroducing the cheetah? The Ministry of Environment and Forests along with the Wildlife Trust of India held a two-day cheetah conference in Gajner, Rajasthan on the 9th-10th of September where cheetah experts from across the world came together to see if cheetahs could in fact find a home in India.
There are two sides to the debate. Those in favour of cheetah reintroduction like Dr Ranjit Sinh, Chairman of the Wildlife Trust of India and Divyabhanusinh Chavda, who has written one of the defining books on cheetahs in India feel that it can be done. This is a view seconded by scientists like Dr Y Jhala of the Wildlife Institute of India, Dehradun who say that there is no conflict of interest; you can both save the tiger and bring back the cheetah since both animals need completely different habitats to survive. Experts believe the cheetah would go a long way in saving our grassland eco-system.
In Namibia and South Africa there have been many cheetah reintroduction trials and through a process of learning, these international experts are now able to share what works and what doesn't. Dr Laurie Marker, Director of the Cheetah Conservation Fund in Namibia says, "We have successfully reintroduced cheetahs in many parts of Africa and we feel that it is a process that is replicable in India, it just needs enough research and the will."
And that's where there are worries, because state governments are not keen on giving their land for cheetah reintroduction and without their support this project is as good as over. Preliminary research carried out by the Wildlife Institute of India points to 11 habitats across MP, Chhatisgarh, Gujarat and Rajasthan where cheetahs could be reintroduced.
Of these Kuno in MP and the Kutch Sanctuary seem more viable because of the presence of prime prey like black buck, chinkara and wild boar and also because they have enough space to allow cheetahs to live and multiply. The MP government has already declined handing over Kuno for cheetah reintroduction and the Gujarat government is also wary.
There is also the big question of whether these animals should be imported straight from the wild or bred in captivity in India. The Gajner Reserve in Rajasthan was explored as a possible site for cheetah breeding because of its landscape and the presence of prime prey, but most experts say breeding is tough and it's far more efficient to import animals straight from the wild, either from Iran or Africa--where you can find the highest cheetah populations in the world.
Ever since the environment ministry decided to look into the viability of cheetah reintroduction, skeptics have been pushing for a retraction. While they are, in principle, not opposed to cheetahs being reintroduced, many, like Rajesh Gopal, Member Secretary of the National Tiger Conservation Authority point out that with man-animal conflicts on the rise and communities living in buffer zones around national parks becoming adversarial, the road ahead will be a tough one. He says "Tigers are already in trouble, so before bringing in cheetahs many of the pending issues need to be addressed so that these animals don't become extinct again."
The ministry is treading cautiously as well, and with pressure from the tiger lobby mounting the environment minister now says that while he is still in favour of cheetah reintroduction, careful thought and planning will need to go into the process before finalizing the road from extinction to reintroduction.