There are more and more lions in India. But what should be a source of celebration is becoming a deadly problem

Five -year -old Pulsing Ajnera was playing with his brothers in a field near his home in the Indian Western state of Gujarat, when a lion “appeared out of nowhere,” the CNN bereaved.

“This lion grabbed the child, my youngest, and took him. My family tried everything to rescue him. They shot stones at the lion and also some wooden sticks, but (he) dragged him to the jungle,” says Hera Ajnera. The boy’s body was later recovered.

Pulsing was one of seven people in India killed by lions this year so far, raising the total of fatal attacks in five years to over 20. The attacks on cattle have almost doubled in the same period, according to reports from residents of Gujarat.

With its unmistakable dark juba and unique folds of skin along the belly, the soul lions are slightly smaller than their African cousins. They were once wandered through the Middle East and Asia, but today Gujarat is the home of the world’s last wild-lions population.

The lions were hunted to the brink of extinction in India, before the prohibition of killing felines being implemented in Gujarat a century ago. Recent conservation efforts have led to state lions population to increase 30%to 891 in the last five years.

Conservationists say that much of the success stems from a unique relationship between humans and lions, where the places profit from the presence of animals and these have room to wander. However, this symbiotic relationship is being tested with the growth of the Lions Population.

“Lions have been found in underground hotel parks … at the top of people’s houses. They are resting on terraces. They are sitting there to roar,” explains wildlife biologist Ravi Chellam, coordinator of the Biodiversity Collarbraitive Conservation Network.

“When a lion enters human -dominated habitats, the probability (attacking people) simply increases,” he says.

For over a decade that Chellam and other conservationists press up the Gujarat government to transfer some lions to a second habitat outside the state.

But Gujarat’s lions have not been transferred anywhere, and their numbers continue to grow – creating the potential for conflict – although a Supreme Court order demanding their relocation.

An expanding population

Gir National Park-a protected area of ​​877 square kilometers, approximately the size of the city of Los Angeles-was created in 1965 to protect in danger species, including the Ashatic lion. Today, most Gujarat’s lions live outside the park’s borders, mixing with humans in cities and villages.

“Theoretically, it is a success story because that was the intention of a conservation project – to increase the number of individuals of this species,” Gujarat’s conservation Jehan Bhujwala explains to CNN.

“But when there are too many animals, they complain about space outside the protected area … and then they start conflicting with the places,” he adds.

Bhujwala states that the Indian conservation model never intended to separate lions from humans, noting that there are villages built within national parks.

“Everyone coexisted, and this coexistence, this tolerance, is very unique in the history of India conservation.”

The local population depends on the lions to generate tourist performance and, in return, the big cats feed on old cattle abandoned by local pastors, wrote Yadvendradev Vikramsinh Jhala, former director of the India Wildlife Institute, in an academic article published last year.

Jhala and her co -authors have concluded that lions also hunt pigs and nilgals – an antelope type – which helps eliminate animals that local farmers consider pests.

The community has learned to live with lions because economic benefits exceed the risks, said Jhala.

“A level of coexistence between people and a great carnivorous like this is not seen anywhere else in the world,” he said.

The bond with the local people is deep.

“If there are Maldharis, there are lions. We are one,” says Lakshman, a 32 -year -old farmer from the Maldhari pastoral community.

But Lakshman, who raises buffaloes and sells milk to support five children and wife, admits that he has noticed an increase in lion attacks on cattle, which, experts, has been deepening the complaints within the community.

Conservationists warn that the dynamics between lions and humans may change soon if measures are not taken to deal with the growth of the lions population.

Stagnated Translocation Plan

Chellam is among the conservationists who ask the government to move some lions for the Kuno Wildlife Sanctuary in the central state of Madhya Pradesh. A survey he and other scientists conducted three decades ago concluded that the area was suitable for lions conservation.

This request was at the center of a court battle filed by the Center for Environment Law and the World Wide Fund for Nature India against the Government in 1994 to force Gujarat’s guardians to act. In 2013, the Supreme Court of India ruled in favor of environmental groups, ordering the Ministry of Environment to take “urgent measures for the reintroduction of the Beenfish Lions of the Gir Forest to Kuno.” The process should have started in six months, with the formation of an expert committee.

Chellam, who is part of the committee, explains that the last meeting took place in 2016. He says that by not calling regular meetings, the government is “dragging its feet” regarding the Supreme Court order.

More than a decade after the court decision, the lions remain only in Gujarat. Complicating the process is the arrival of Chitas imported from South Africa and Namibia to the Kuno Sanctuary.

The first Chitas arrived in India after their extinction in the country. Some offspring died shortly thereafter, but currently live in Kuno 31 animals, indicating a “successful population growth,” according to one.

The Chitas program is part of the Indian government’s effort to turn the country into a global feline conservation leader. In 2023, Prime Minister Narendra Modi launched the International Big Cat Alliance to save seven large felines-tigers, lions, leopards, black leopards, chitas, jaguars and tights-.

Chellam considers that the presence of chitas in Kuno will further delay the translocation of lions – if it is still on the table – within 20 years, the time required for the population of Chitas to stabilize before introducing another species.

Gujarat Forest Services, Jaipal Singh, declined CNN’s request to comment on the latest developments.

Translocation resistance also comes from local authorities and the tourism industry, afraid of losing business and the exclusivity of the state as the only place in India to observe lions in the wild, according to Chellam.

Efforts to keep lions in Gujarat

The Gujarat government presented an alternative to translocation to Kuno.

It proposes to move some lions to the wildlife sanctuary of Bard, within the borders of the state, stressing that 17 Asian lions were sighted there for the first time since 1879.

The government has also increased financing for lions protection by over 70% over the past three years to $ 18.2 million in 2023-2024-a sign of its commitment to protect the species.

However, Chellam states that Barda is too small and has few fangs to support a viable population of lions.

It is also too close to the Gir National Park to prevent the spread of disease, which means that a catastrophic pandemic could exterminate the entire Gujarat-lions population.

“Having all the eggs in the same basket is very risky. If there is an outbreak of disease, then we have problems.”

Pulsing’s father, Ajnera, used to believe that humans and lions could coexist. He moved to the district of Amreli, known for lions sightings seven years ago as an agricultural worker.

His house was 200 meters from the forest, and it has never occurred for lions to attack humans. “This usually doesn’t happen here.”

Now, mourned, it has changed its ideas. “We could no longer live there. We left the area and moved to another village, 5 kilometers further. We were afraid.”