Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve: The 7th Tiger Reserve in MP

The Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change has notified Veerangana Durgawati Tiger Reserve as the 7th Tiger Reserve of Madhya Pradesh with a view to ensuring the conservation of wild animals.

The total number of notified Tiger reserves in India now stands at 55. Dholpur- Karauli Tiger Reserve of Rajasthan was the 54th Tiger reserve in the country.

Until now, MP was home to six tiger reserves – Kanha, Bandhavgarh, Satpura, Pench, Panna and Sanjay-Dubri.

Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve 

• The central government had imposed certain conditions on the Madhya Pradesh government while granting conditional approval to the Ken -Betwa river linking project. 
• The Madhya Pradesh government was asked to create a Tiger reserve combining the Nauradehi and Durgavati Wildlife sanctuary. 
• In the month of June 2023, Madhya Pradesh notified the Nauredhi and Durgavati Wildlife Sanctuary as a combined notified area spread across Sagar, Damoh and Narsinghpur districts. 
• Later, the government renamed the combined notified area as Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve. 
• The total area of the Veerangana Durgavati Tiger Reserve is around 2,339 sq km. About 1,414 square kilometres in the tiger reserve have been included in the core area, and 925.12 square kilometres in the buffer zone.

Status of Tiger in India 

• Around 75% of the world’s wild tiger population is found in India. After India, Russia has the second-largest population of wild tigers. 
• According to the All India Tiger Estimation Report -2022 census, the total number of wild tigers in India is estimated to be 3925 in 2022 as compared to 2967 in 2018. 
• The largest tiger population of 785 is in Madhya Pradesh, followed by Karnataka (563) & Uttarakhand (560) and Maharashtra (444).
• The highest tiger population in a tiger reserve is in Jim Corbett (260), followed by Bandipur (150), Nagarhole (141), Bandhavgarh (135), Dudhwa (135), Mudumalai (114), Kanha (105), Kaziranga (104), Sundarbans (100), Tadoba (97), Sathyamangalam (85), and Pench (77).

Tiger Reserves in India 

There are 55 tiger reserves in India.

Largest by Area: Nagarjunsagar SrisailamTiger Reserve, Andhra Pradesh.

Smallest by Area: Bor Tiger Reserve in Maharashtra

Union Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change: Bhupendra Yadav