Each year the International Tiger Day takes place on 29 July. It was released in 2010, following the Tiger Summit in Saint Petersburg. The Summit was held to raise awareness of the sharp decline in wild tiger numbers, leaving them at the verge of extinction.
Minister for the Environment Prakash Javadekar posted a short video on Twitter, explaining how the remarkable success was achieved. "15 months, 3,81,400 sq km of forest area survey and 5,93,882 man days ...," the video said. "The Tiger project was launched in 1973 with just nine tiger reserves. India today has 50 reserves with 2,967 tigers," Mr Javadekar tweeted.
On the microblogging site, Piyush Goyal, who holds the Railways and Commerce and Industry portfolios in the Narendra Modi cabinet, wrote: "Balancing between modernisation and conservation, PM has been at the forefront of saving tigers ... .
There are not just tigers, there are 30,000 elephants, 3,000 one-horned rhinoceros and more than 500 lions in the country's numerous wildlife sanctuaries.