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Ecology & Environment
Pradeep Kumar

21/03/21 12:05 PM IST

Source: Indian Express

Asiatic cheetahs in India

In news

The animal is believed to have disappeared from India when Maharaja Ramanuj Pratap Singh Deo of Koriya hunted and shot the last three recorded Asiatic cheetahs in India in 1947.

Highlights
  • It was declared extinct by the government in 1952.
  • Nearly 70 years after the cheetah was declared locally extinct or extirpated, India will receive its first batch of the large cats from Africa by the end of this year.
  • This is the first time in the world that a large carnivore will be relocated from one continent to another.
  • The current relocation attempt began in 2009, it is only last year that the Supreme Court gave the green signal to the Centre.
African cheetah and Asiatic cheetah
  • Before Namibia, India had approached Iran for Asiatic cheetahs, but had been refused. The Asiatic cheetah is classified as a “critically endangered” species by the IUCN Red List, and is believed to survive only in Iran.
  • From 400 in the 1990s, their numbers are estimated to have plummetted to 50-70 today, because of poaching, hunting of their main prey (gazelles) and encroachment on their habitat.
Asiatic cheetahs in India
  • In 1947, Maharaja Ramanuj Pratap Singh Deo of Koriya (now in Chhattisgarh) reportedly killed the last known Asiatic cheetah in India.
  • In that year, a few miles from Ramgarh village in the state, the Maharaja killed three of the animal.
Source: Indian Express

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