As many as 306 tigers were recorded in Tamil Nadu in the nation-wide census by the National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) for the year 2022. This figure is an increase from the 264 big cats found in the 2018 survey.
The NTCA report also showed a population of 3,682 tigers across India, a jump from a mere 1,411 in 2006.
According to the NTCA’s ‘Management Effectiveness Evaluation’ (MEE) report released in April, Tamil Nadu’s Anamalai Tiger Reserve and Mudumalai Tiger Reserve were among the top 12 tiger reserves ranked ‘excellent’ out of the 51 in the country. As per the report, only the Western Ghats region showed a decline in tiger numbers with the “major population being stable”. As of 2018, the tiger population was estimated at 981 tigers in the region and the number dropped to 824 in 2022.