Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh is all set to welcome the eight Namibian cheetahs on Saturday. (AP)Prime Minister Narendra Modi will be releasing the cheetahs being brought from Namibia in Madhya Pradesh’s Kuno National Park on Saturday morning, an official said on Friday. The special cargo plane carrying the eight cheetahs from Namibia has landed at the Gwalior airport in Madhya Pradesh at around 7.50 am on September 17, which is also PM Modi’s birthday, senior officials confirmed.
Meanwhile, PM Modi is scheduled to arrive at the Gwalior airport from New Delhi at around 9.20 am and leave for Kuno National Park (KNP) in Sheopur district, about 165 km away, where he will release cheetahs into quarantine enclosures at around 10.45 am, the official added.
However, a day before PM Modi releases eight cheetahs brought from Namibia in a Madhya Pradesh national park, the Congress said Friday that the proposal for ‘Project Cheetah’ was prepared in 2008-09 and approved by the then Manmohan Singh-led UPA government. The opposition party also said that in 2013, the Supreme Court had stayed the project, and in 2020, that the apex court allowed it, paving the way for the cheetahs to come to India.
The cheetahs will fly overnight to travel during the coolest hours of the day. (Photo credit: CCF)
Madhya Pradesh Governor Mangubhai Patel and Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan have left Bhopal for Gwalior airbase where the cargo plane carrying the cheetahs and crew from Namibia landed earlier today.
Later in the day, PM Modi will be releasing two male sibling cheetahs into one quarantine enclosure and another female cheetah into the adjacent enclosure. The quarantine enclosures are 50×30 metres in dimension and there are six such enclosures for eight big cats.
They will stay here for a month during their quarantine period before being moved into a larger enclosure which is 5 square km and has nine compartments.
Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister's office has confirmed that the big cats have landed, reports Express' Iram Siddiqui.
Senior officials have confirmed that the cargo carrying cheetahs have just landed at the Gwalior airport, reports Express' Iram Siddiqui.
The flight was scheduled to land at around 6.30 am, but was delayed. It will take about 30 mins for the immigration process and other formalities, following which the cheetahs will be put on an airforce helicopter and flown to the Kuno National Park.
There has been a delay in the flight carrying the cheetahs from Namibia, as per the flight-tracking website FlightRadar24.
The plane is now expected to land in Jaipur at 7.52 am, over an hour after the scheduled landing time of 6.38 am. However, the landing point was changed from Jaipur to Gwalior, as per an official communication. More details are awaited.
Wildlife experts are relocating cheetahs from Namibia to Madhya Pradesh, as part of efforts to reintroduce the world's fastest land animal into India.
According to the official Twitter handle of the Indian High Commission in Namibia, the cheetahs are set to arrive in their "new home", the Kuno National Park in MP, soon
Over 70 years after it went extinct in India, the cheetah will return to the country on Saturday, September 17, coinciding with Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s birthday. Eight African cheetahs from Namibia — five females and three males between the ages of 4-6 years — will be flown 8,000 km over the Indian ocean to the Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh, where they will be released as part of India’s Rs 90-crore Cheetah Introduction project.
India was to receive 20 African cheetahs this year – eight from Namibia and another 12 from South Africa — but Environment Ministry officials have said that while all the protocols from the Indian side to bring the South African cheetahs had been completed, assent from the South African government is still awaited.
This is the first time in the world that a large carnivore will be relocated from one continent to another. Esha Roy explains
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Kuno National Park in Madhya Pradesh is all set to welcome the eight Namibian cheetahs on Saturday as officials battled heavy rain, inclement weather and some blocked roads to complete the preparations for the Prime Minister’s programme to release the big cats.
The special cargo plane carrying the felines, which left Namibia Friday, will land at Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh between 6 am and 6:30 am, instead of Jaipur in Rajasthan, as planned earlier, officials said.
The animals will then be flown to Kuno in Sheopur district (165 km away) on an Air Force helicopter, which will take about 20-25 minutes.
Gwalior SP Amit Sanghi told The Indian Express: “We are expecting the aircraft carrying the cheetahs to land early morning at the airbase in Gwalior. All necessary arrangements to ensure a swift and smooth transition will be made.” Iram Siddique reports