A tiger from Ranthambore Tiger Reserve has been spotted inside Kuno National Park, Madhya Pradesh, home to India’s resident cheetah population. The big cat, identified as T-2512, was first noticed by a tourist and has since been confirmed by park authorities.
Officials are not alarmed. The field director noted that this particular tiger has been moving between Ranthambore and Kuno for several months, a pattern made possible by the shared forest landscape connecting both reserves. Authorities have confirmed no threat to the cheetahs currently living in the park.
Kuno presently houses 54 cheetahs, including cubs. Three have been relocated to Gandhi Sagar Wildlife Sanctuary in Mandsaur over the past year. The park has been central to India’s cheetah reintroduction programme since its launch in September 2022, when eight cheetahs arrived from Namibia. Twelve more followed from South Africa, and a further nine were brought in from Botswana roughly a month ago, steadily building what has become one of conservation’s most watched experiments.
