India, March 11 -- Madhav National Park in Madhya Pradesh being designated a tiger reserve is testimony of India's success with tiger conservation. In a little under two decades since 2006, the big cat population has more than doubled, from 1,411 to 3,682. Given that the animal is at the top of the food chain in Indian jungles, the population's recovery from the brink is an indicator of not just the anti-poaching efforts and crackdown on illegal trade but also the strides made in improving the health of jungle ecosystems in the country - a conservation coup in these times of rapid erosion of biodiversity worldwide.

Tiger conservation in the country has undergone necessary evolution through the decades since the seed was laid in 1973, in ...