Project Tiger and NTCA

The launch, the crisis, and the statutory body

• Project Tiger was launched on 1 April 1973 by the environment ministry. It began with 9 tiger reserves.
• India’s tiger count had fallen to around 1,827 by the early 1970s. It was an estimated 40,000 at the end of the 19th century. That collapse forced the government to act.
• The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) was created in 2006. An amendment to the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972 set it up. It gave Project Tiger a statutory body.
• The NTCA followed the Tiger Task Force’s recommendation. The task force was formed after tigers were found wiped out at Sariska in 2004-05.

The network today, and the recovery

• India now has 58 tiger reserves. They cover nearly 2.3% of the country’s land area.
• The 2022 All India Tiger Estimation counted 3,682 wild tigers. That was about 75% of the world’s wild tigers.

Core and buffer, and how tigers get counted

• Each tiger reserve has a core area, the Critical Tiger Habitat, and a buffer zone. This follows the 2006 amendment’s framework.
• The All India Tiger Estimation runs once every four years. It uses camera traps, field surveys, and habitat assessment.

The Sariska crisis, and the report that followed

• The Sariska crisis came to light in December 2004. A CBI probe found that poachers had killed all its tigers since 2002. The reserve had effectively held zero tigers for years before anyone noticed.
• The Tiger Task Force, chaired by Sunita Narain, submitted “Joining The Dots” in 2005. It recommended a statutory NTCA and a separate Wildlife Crime Control Bureau.
• For the wider conservation landscape, see Wildlife in India. For the body that clears projects near protected areas, see the National Board for Wildlife.
• Namdapha was India’s 15th reserve under the programme. It is the only protected area on Earth confirmed to hold all four big cats together. See Namdapha National Park.

A real gap exposed, and a world-leading recovery

• Project Tiger began as a habitat-protection scheme run departmentally. Sariska exposed a real gap. Reserves existed on paper, but their tigers were gone on the ground.
• India’s count rose from under 1,900 in the early 1970s to over 3,600 by 2022. It is often cited as one of the most successful large-carnivore programmes in the world.
• India holds about three-quarters of the world’s wild tigers by the 2022 count. Its conservation choices largely decide the species’ global future.
• Project Tiger’s first Director, Kailash Sankhala, shaped its early field-research approach. See Kailash Sankhala: The Tiger Man of India.

Tigers return to Buxa (2 October 2026)

• [Policy] On 2 October 2026, three-year-old tigress T138 was released into Buxa Tiger Reserve in West Bengal. (Source: The Hindu)
• She was brought from Bihar’s Valmiki Tiger Reserve, which has similar terrain. (Source: The Hindu)
• She will first stay in an enclosure of about 2.3 hectares to settle in. Telemetry, camera traps and field teams will track her. (Source: The Hindu)
• Two to three more tigers are likely to follow. The goal is a breeding, self-sustaining population. (Source: The Hindu)
• Buxa became a tiger reserve in 1983 but lost its stable resident tiger population. Reintroduction has now been tried in 12 reserves since Sariska and Panna in 2008. (Source: The Hindu)

International Tiger Day 2026

• On 28 July 2026, ahead of International Tiger Day, PIB said India is home to nearly 70% of the world’s wild tigers. The world total is roughly 5,711. (Source: PIB)
• The reserve network covers about 84,500 square kilometres. That is around 2.56% of India’s area, per the NTCA’s 2023 report.
• India helped found the International Big Cat Alliance (IBCA). It is a 95-country coalition covering all seven big cats. Cabinet approved it on 12 March 2024. Its Secretariat is in India.
• India hosts the Global Tiger Forum in New Delhi. It is the only intergovernmental body devoted solely to tigers. It has 13 tiger-range countries.
• Monitoring uses M-STrIPES for GPS-based field tracking. AI tools help too. CaTRAT sorts camera-trap images by species. ExtractCompare identifies individual tigers by stripe pattern.
• By 2022, 51 tiger reserves had been assessed for management effectiveness. Twelve scored “Excellent”. The average score was 78%. Twenty-three reserves hold global CA|TS accreditation.

The 29th NTCA meeting (9 July 2026)

• Union Minister Bhupender Yadav chaired the 29th NTCA meeting at Coimbatore.
• The Authority released “Roadmap to Rescue”, a framework for rescuing wild animals in tiger landscapes. It also released “STRIDES 2026”, a status report on reserve infrastructure and ecology.
• The meeting approved the 2024-25 Annual Report. It discussed a 6th cycle of Management Effectiveness Evaluation. It also considered a national “Tiger Conclave” for funds and a research symposium called STRIPES.

Sariska reintroduction workshop (28 June 2026)

• Bhupender Yadav inaugurated a national workshop on “Tiger Re-introduction: Opportunities & Challenges” at Alwar, Rajasthan. It marked 18 years since reintroduction began at Sariska.
• Sariska has gone from zero tigers after 2004-05 to 56 today. The NTCA ran the workshop with the Rajasthan government. It drew 12 Chief Wildlife Wardens and 18 Field Directors.
• Three publications were released: a Road Map on Active Management of Tigers, a Booklet on Reintroduction and Recovery, and the Annual Report of Project Cheetah.
• For the human side of big-cat habitats, see Human-Wildlife Conflict in India.