Pariksha SaathiTwo Great Indian Bustards Released Into the Wild at Desert National Park, Jaisalmer
On 4 October 2026, Union Environment Minister Bhupender Yadav set two male Great Indian Bustards (GIB) free at Sam in Jaisalmer's Desert National Park, Rajasthan, with the state's Forest Minister Sanjay Sharma present. Yadav credited the milestone to almost ten years of effort by scientists, researchers and field staff. For this critically endangered bird, the release marks a move from building a viable conservation-breeding population to rewilding, and experience from it will be used to refine protocols for later releases. The Bustard Recovery Programme is run by the Environment Ministry, the Rajasthan Forest Department and the Wildlife Institute of India, with technical help from the International Fund for Houbara Conservation and funding from National CAMPA. Its breeding centres at Sam and Ramdevra now hold 97 birds — 86 kept for breeding and 11 marked for release, two of which were freed on this occasion — and captive breeding produced 24 chicks in 2025 and 29 in 2026. A separate 'jumpstart' technique has also helped: eggs laid in captivity were put into wild nests, where the brooding females adopted them, and six chicks hatched in Rajasthan and two in Gujarat.
Drafted with AI assistance from the official PIB release linked above and checked against it by a second AI pass. Not line-edited by a human.
Learning context
The Great Indian Bustard (Ardeotis nigriceps) is assessed as Critically Endangered on the IUCN Red List, is protected under Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, and is the state bird of Rajasthan. It has been listed on Appendix I of the Convention on Migratory Species (CMS) since 2020, when the convention's 13th Conference of Parties met in Gandhinagar, India.
Reference: Convention on Migratory Species — Great Indian Bustard species page
Check yourself: is 'Critically Endangered' a category under India's Wildlife (Protection) Act?
No. 'Critically Endangered' is an IUCN Red List category, a global assessment of extinction risk. Legal protection in India comes from the Act's Schedules, and the GIB is in Schedule I.
Revision task: from this release, separate the conservation-breeding figures (birds held, chicks produced) from the rewilding step (birds released), and list the institutions that run the programme.
Test yourself
The breeding centres of the Great Indian Bustard Recovery Programme in Rajasthan are located at Sam and which other place?
Show the answer
Answer: Ramdevra
The centres at Sam and Ramdevra hold 97 birds; two male bustards were released at Desert National Park, Jaisalmer, on 4 October 2026, a move from conservation breeding to rewilding.
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