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Elephants and other land mammals
Elephants and India's other land mammals as species, from rhinos and wolves to primates, small cats and bats: their status, range and protection, and the counts and corridors they depend on. Prelims has asked about elephant herds, gestation and State populations.
2 Sep 2026 · Prelims
The striped hyena
- The striped hyena (Hyaena hyaena) is India's only hyena, a nocturnal scavenger of carrion and not the spotted hyena of Africa.
- It is Near Threatened on the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) Red List.
- It is on Schedule I of the Wildlife (Protection) Act, 1972, which carries the strictest penalties for hunting.
- It lives in dry scrub and rocky hills across much of India.
- India holds an estimated 1,000 to 3,000, a range reported in September 2026 with no official census behind it.
- No national action plan covers it, so it is protected at the highest level the law offers and managed under no plan of its own.
No census and no action plan
A listing settles what may not be done to an animal; it does not oblige anyone to count it. A September 2026 report set out what that leaves open for a species the law already protects at its highest level.
- No earlier count exists for the range to be measured against, so no trend is known and nothing says whether the animal is gaining or losing ground.
- The case the report makes for it is sanitary, since a scavenger that clears carcasses removes the pathogens in them.
Elephant
India now has a genetic baseline for its elephants, read from dung rather than from sightings, and the question the count leaves behind is not how many there are but how far they can still move. The Supreme Court has ordered the corridors between their forests resurveyed.
Also drawn on, not yet tied to one subject: PIB, 12 Aug 2026: World Elephant Day: first DNA-based count puts wild elephants at 22,446 (opens in a new tab)
12 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains
The elephant
- The Asian elephant Elephas maximus is a keystone species, dispersing seeds and opening pathways that other species then use.
- It is Endangered on the Red List of the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
- It is a Schedule I species under the Wild Life (Protection) Act, 1972.
- It lives in moist and dry forest and grassland, and India holds nearly 60 per cent of the world's wild Asian elephants.
- The wild population was put at 22,446 by the Synchronous All India Population Estimation of Elephants (SAIEE), run from 2021 to 2025.
- Its main threats are human elephant conflict, blocked migratory routes and habitat degraded by invasive weeds.
- Project Elephant, launched in 1992, is the conservation programme, with 33 Elephant Reserves across 14 States.
UPSC has asked
- Prelims 2020: Indian elephants, herd leadership, gestation and State populations
12 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains
Synchronous All India Population Estimation of Elephants
SAIEE was released on World Elephant Day as India's first elephant count built on DNA fingerprinting. A count read from genes can be repeated and set against the next one, which is what makes this a baseline rather than one more estimate.
- It read genetic identity from dung samples rather than counting sightings.
18 Aug 2026 · 12 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains
Elephant corridors
An elephant corridor is the part of the range that no reserve boundary covers, and it is where the animal and the farmer meet. The Supreme Court has now ordered the whole national map of them resurveyed.
East Central52
North East48
Southern32
Northern18
- The 2023 assessment validated 150 corridors, and that is the map now being redrawn.
- Nineteen of them cross State lines and six reach into Nepal, which is why a single State cannot settle a route on its own.
- The Court gave eight weeks for a report on removing obstructions.
- It held that no State may block a traditional route over crop damage.
- It asked the Centre to check reports of fireballs, torches and spikes, banned in 2018, still driving elephants away.
The Hindu, 18 Aug 2026: Supreme Court: no State can block elephant corridors (opens in a new tab) · PIB, 12 Aug 2026: World Elephant Day: first DNA-based count puts wild elephants at 22,446 (opens in a new tab)
12 Aug 2026 · Prelims and Mains
Project Elephant
Project Elephant marked World Elephant Day with two announcements, and neither was about how many elephants there are. Both were about conflict, which is where elephants and people now meet most often.
- It released a Regional Action Plan on human elephant conflict for the southern States.
- It also set out 30 Giant Steps for elephant conservation.
Also filed elsewhere
- Invasive weeds in elephant habitat · on Invasive alien species
A forest can stand intact and still hold nothing an elephant will eat.