Did cheetah introduction increase revenue like Mumbai penguin project? Aaditya Thackeray

Mumbai: Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Aaditya Thackeray on Sunday wondered whether the introduction of cheetahs at Kuno Park in Madhya Pradesh translated into the generation of revenue, claiming penguins in the Mumbai zoo boosted the income of the civic body.

"One should find out how much revenue generated after cheetahs were translocated to India (in Kuno Park in Madhya Pradesh)," Thackeray told reporters.

The former state minister claimed the introduction of penguins in the civic-run Veermata Jijabai Bhosale Botanical Udyan contributed to increased earnings for the Brihanmumbai Municipal Corporation (BMC).

The BMC, run by the undivided Shiv Sena till 2022 before it was brought under the administrator, introduced eight Humboldt penguins in 2016. The penguin launch project was believed to be the brainchild of Aaditya Thackeray.

‘Project Cheetah’, the world’s first inter-continental large wild carnivore translocation project, saw the light of day on September 17, 2022, with the release of eight felines brought from Namibia into a special enclosure at the Kuno National Park (KNP) in Madhya Pradesh.

Some of the 20 cheetahs brought to India so far -- eight from Namibia in September 2022 and 12 from South Africa last February -- were initially released into the wild but were brought back to their enclosures by August 13, 2023, after three cheetahs died due to septicemia.

All 25 cheetahs -- 13 adults and 12 cubs -- are doing well.