After Kuno National Park (KNP) in Madhya Pradesh, cheetahs brought from Africa will start roaming Gujarat’s Banni grassland in the near future as the central government has approved a proposal to set up a cheetah conservation breeding centre in Kutch district.

“Cheetahs are returning to the diverse Gujarat!” Mulu Bera, Gujarat’s minister for forest and environment, broke the news on his official X handle on Friday evening.

Talking to The Indian Express on Saturday, Bera said that Gujarat wants cheetahs to recapture their lost territory. “Banni was a home of cheetahs in the past. It is a very good grassland which can be developed to host free-ranging wild cheetahs. Therefore, we had requested the central government to set up a conservation breeding centre of cheetahs in this grassland and we are thankful to the Centre for approving our proposal,” the minister said. “The project will improve Banni grassland and in future, we will try to establish a population of free-ranging wild cheetahs in Banni. Once that happens, they will become a major attraction in Gujarat,” he added.

Spread over 2,500 sq km in Gujarat’s Kutch district, Banni is among the finest and largest grasslands in India. A protected forest, the grassland is dotted by 52 villages and is known for the coveted Banni breed of buffaloes.

Professor Yadvendradevsinh Jhala, the former dean of the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) who played a key role in doing technical studies to prepare KNP for hosting cheetahs and then flying the first batch of African cheetahs from Namibia to Kuno in 2022, welcomed the move. “This is fantastic news for Banni,” Jhala said, adding, “There are records of cheetahs having been sighted near Mandvi in Kutch in the 18th century. We had surveyed Banni in 2012 as a potential habitat for cheetahs. However, we found the prey base was very low. But if cheetahs are reintroduced after establishing enough prey base, they will revitalise the grassland ecosystem of Banni.”