World Rhino Day focus on India-Bhutan joint conservation
On World Rhino Day (22 September), attention turned to the recovery of the greater one-horned rhino population in Manas Tiger Reserve, Assam, which had been wiped out by poaching and insurgency-linked disturbance in the 1990s but has since been rebuilt through translocation to roughly 48 individuals over about two decades.
The recovery is credited to the Indian Rhino Vision 2020 (IRV 2020) translocation programme, under which rhinos were moved from Kaziranga National Park and Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary to re-establish a breeding population in Manas.
Because Manas National Park in Assam shares an unfenced international boundary with Royal Manas National Park in Bhutan, rhinos are increasingly moving across the border, raising fresh questions about coordinated cross-border monitoring, anti-poaching patrolling and habitat management.
Officials and conservationists used the occasion to flag the need for stronger India-Bhutan joint conservation mechanisms to track and protect the shared, growing rhino population.
Assam recorded zero known rhino-poaching cases in 2025, only the second such year since the 1970s (after 2022), underscoring the broader success of the state's rhino protection effort even as transboundary movement adds new management complexity.
Species Reintroduction and Translocation Programmes
Translocation is a conservation strategy in which individuals of a species are deliberately captured and moved from a source population to a depleted or vacant habitat to re-establish a viable population. Indian Rhino Vision 2020 (IRV 2020), launched in 2005, was a partnership of the Assam Forest Department, the Bodoland Territorial Council, the International Rhino Foundation, WWF-India and the US Fish and Wildlife Service, with the goal of raising Assam's wild greater one-horned rhino population to at least 3,000 individuals spread across seven protected areas by 2020. Manas lost its entire rhino population to poaching during the Bodo insurgency of the 1990s; translocations into the park began in 2006 and continued through 2021, rebuilding a breeding population from zero. A successor framework, Indian Rhino Vision 2.0, was launched around 2021-22 with an expanded target of 4,500-5,000 rhinos across at least three meta-populations in Assam by 2030.
Key Details
- IRV 2020: launched 2005; target 3,000 rhinos across 7 protected areas by 2020.
- Manas translocations ran 2006-2021, drawing source animals mainly from Kaziranga National Park and Pobitora Wildlife Sanctuary.
- IRV 2.0: successor programme (from c. 2021-22); target 4,500-5,000 rhinos in at least 3 meta-populations by 2030.
- Greater one-horned rhino is listed under Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972; CITES Appendix I; IUCN Red List status Vulnerable (downlisted from Endangered in 2008, the only large Asian mammal to be downlisted).
The ~48-strong Manas population cited on World Rhino Day is the direct outcome of the IRV 2020 translocation effort, making Manas a textbook example of ex-situ-to-in-situ species recovery through translocation.
Transboundary Wildlife Conservation: India-Bhutan
Transboundary conservation refers to coordinated management of contiguous ecosystems that straddle an international border, since wildlife does not recognise political boundaries. Manas National Park (Assam) is directly contiguous with Royal Manas National Park in Bhutan, together forming one of the largest unbroken forest landscapes in the eastern Himalayan foothills. In 2019, India joined Bhutan, Nepal, Indonesia and Malaysia in adopting the New Delhi Declaration to strengthen cooperation on the conservation of Asian rhino species (the greater one-horned rhino, Javan rhino and Sumatran rhino) across range countries.
Key Details
- Royal Manas National Park (Bhutan) and Manas National Park (India, Assam) form a contiguous transboundary conservation landscape.
- New Delhi Declaration, 2019: India, Bhutan, Nepal, Indonesia, Malaysia agreed to cooperate on Asian rhino conservation.
- Transboundary conservation requires joint anti-poaching patrols, data-sharing and coordinated habitat corridors, none of which are automatically triggered simply because a protected area shares a border.
Rising rhino movement across the India-Bhutan border at Manas is exactly the scenario the New Delhi Declaration framework anticipates, and highlights the operational gap between having a declaration and having joint ground-level protocols.
Protected Area Categories: The Manas Complex
India layers multiple, legally distinct protected-area designations on the same landscape, each with a different statutory basis. Manas is simultaneously a National Park (highest protection, no rights permitted, declared under the Wildlife Protection Act, 1972), a Tiger Reserve (declared under Project Tiger/the National Tiger Conservation Authority framework, focused on tiger source populations), a UNESCO World Heritage Site (inscribed in 1985, in-danger listed 1992-2011 due to insurgency-linked poaching and removed from the danger list in 2011), a Biosphere Reserve, and an Elephant Reserve.
Key Details
- Manas Wildlife Sanctuary/National Park core zone: about 500 sq km; Manas Tiger Reserve (with buffer): about 2,837 sq km.
- UNESCO World Heritage Site status: inscribed 1985; placed on the List of World Heritage in Danger in 1992 due to poaching and civil unrest; removed from the danger list in 2011.
- Distinguishing feature: National Park status bars all human rights/use; a Wildlife Sanctuary permits some regulated use; a Tiger Reserve designation is layered on top for tiger-specific protection and funding under Project Tiger.
Manas's recovery from a "World Heritage in Danger" site to a rhino and tiger conservation success story is precisely why it was chosen as the flagship site for World Rhino Day coverage of India-Bhutan cooperation.
- Manas rhino population: approximately 48 (2026), rebuilt from zero after 1990s poaching, via translocations conducted 2006-2021.
- IRV 2020 (2005): target of 3,000 rhinos across 7 Assam protected areas by 2020; successor IRV 2.0 targets 4,500-5,000 rhinos by 2030.
- Greater one-horned rhino: IUCN status Vulnerable (since 2008 downlisting); CITES Appendix I; Wildlife Protection Act, 1972 Schedule I.
- Manas: UNESCO World Heritage Site since 1985 (in-danger listing 1992-2011); shares border with Royal Manas National Park, Bhutan.
- New Delhi Declaration (2019): India, Bhutan, Nepal, Indonesia, Malaysia, Asian rhino conservation cooperation.
- Assam recorded zero rhino-poaching cases in 2025, the second such year since the 1970s (the first being 2022).