Five More African Cheetah Cubs Born in Kuno
New Delhi: Madhya Pradesh’s Kuno National Park is now home to five more African cheetah cubs. The cubs were born to cheetah Aasha – one of the cheetahs brought in from Namibia in 2022 – on Saturday, February 7.
The birth of the new litter now takes the number of African cheetahs in India to 35 — this includes 24 cubs born in India and 11 adults that have been brought in from Namibia and South Africa.
New cheetah cubs
Union environment minister Bhupender Yadav made the announcement on February 7 through a post on social media platform X.
Kuno Welcomes the Birth of FIVE Cubs 🐆✨
Aasha’s legacy leaps forward—India welcomes her five adorable cubs!
A moment of immense pride and joy for Project Cheetah as Aasha, the Namibian cheetah and a proud second-time mother, gave birth to five cubs on 7th February 2026 at… pic.twitter.com/vTXFkZJoso
— Bhupender Yadav (@byadavbjp) February 7, 2026
Yadav, in his post, said that the moment was one “of immense pride and joy for Project Cheetah”. “This joyous achievement stands as a shining testimony to the unwavering dedication, skill, and commitment of the field staff and veterinarians working tirelessly on the ground,” he added.
The Union government implemented Project Cheetah in 2022, by welcoming eight African cheetahs from Namibia into Kuno in September that year. The project aims to establish cheetah populations in select grassland habitats in India in an effort to ‘bring back’ the species that went extinct in India by around the 1950s.
However, it is crucial to note that India was home to a different subspecies of cheetah – the Asiatic cheetah – and not the African subspecies.
Posting about the latest birth of the cheetah cubs on social media, Madhya Pradesh chief minister Mohan Yadav claimed that the state was emerging as the “epicentre of wildlife conservation”.
Kuno has witnessed a moment of pure pride as Aasha gives birth to five healthy cubs, strengthening India’s cheetah conservation journey.
With this, the number of Indian-born cubs rises to 24 and the total cheetah population reaches 35.
This achievement reflects the tireless… pic.twitter.com/rwMFpAtFn8
— Dr Mohan Yadav (@DrMohanYadav51) February 7, 2026
Many experts including wildlife biologists, social scientists and activists have raised numerous concerns about the project – ranging from questioning the need to invest crores in bringing in a different subspecies into India instead of funding conservation programmes for native and threatened wildlife in the country (such as the Indian wolf and Great Indian bustard), to concerns around managing interactions between local communities and the African cheetahs released in the wild.
For instance, villagers have been reported pelting the animals with stones after a cheetah brought down a calf in a village outside Kuno.
More adult cheetahs to arrive?
Per a report by The Times of India, Mohan Yadav recently announced that eight adult cheetahs would arrive from Botswana to Kuno on February 28.
The report quoted unnamed officials as saying that arrangements related to transport, quarantine and post-arrival protocols were reviewed during a meeting that included the Madhya Pradesh chief minister and union environment minister at Delhi recently.
The environment minister also mentioned that cheetahs would be arriving at Kuno from Botswana by the end of February, while speaking at a conference for officials of tiger reserves and tiger range states at Alwar, Rajasthan, on Saturday (February 7).
According to news reports, Botswana had formally handed over eight cheetahs to India in November last year at the Mokolodi Nature Reserve during president Droupadi Murmu’s state visit to the country.
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