Eight cheetahs from Namibia are reaching India after nearly seven decades of extinction.The last known Asiatic cheetah was shot by Maharaja Ramanuj Pratap Singh Deo in 1947. Ramanuj Pratap Singh was the Maharaja of the princely state of Korea, which is today known as Chhattisgarh. There are five female and three male cheetahs. They will reach Madhya Pradesh on September 17. These cheetahs are traveling more than 8,000 km in transcontinental transfer. A modified Boeing 747 cargo plane has been used for their travel. Kuno National Park, spread over 750 sq km in Chambal, has a large population of antelope, nilgai, wild boar, spotted deer and sambar, which are available for substantial hunting for cheetahs. More cheetahs are expected to return to the country in the future. Records from Emperor Akbar’s reign from 1556 to 1605 show that the number of cheetahs was about 10,000. Research suggests that by the 19th century this number had fallen to a few hundreds.Akbar, a Mughal emperor, is said to have kept 1,000 cheetahs in his wild cattle shed and captured over 9,000 cheetahs during his half-century reign in the 16th century.