History of Ratapani: From Bhimbetka to Tiger Reserve

The story of Ratapani begins in its sandstone hills. At Bhimbetka, on the southern edge of the Vindhya range and inside today’s Ratapani forest, more than 750 rock shelters spread over about 10 km show continuous human settlement from the Stone Age (Acheulean period) to around the 2nd century BCE. Some shelters were lived in more than 100,000 years ago.

Around 400 shelters carry paintings in red, white, yellow and green made from natural pigments such as haematite and charcoal. They show hunters with bows and barbed spears, dancers, mothers and children, and animals including deer, bison, boar, rhinoceros and big cats. The earliest paintings are dated to at least 10,000 years ago.

Near Pangoraria village, on the edge of the Ratapani landscape, the Saru Maru caves were a Buddhist monastic site. They carry carved Buddhist symbols and two inscriptions linked to Emperor Ashoka: a Minor Rock Edict and a record of his visit to the area while he was still a prince and viceroy. Old temple remains near Delawadi also point to the region’s long religious history.

In the 11th century the Paramara king Raja Bhoj of Malwa built the great Shiva temple at Bhojpur, just north of the Ratapani hills. In later centuries these forests fell within the domains of Gond rulers.

Their most dramatic legacy is Ginnorgarh Fort, built on an isolated hilltop deep in the forest near Delawadi. Local history links it with the Gond king Nizam Shah and Rani Kamlapati, after whom Bhopal’s Rani Kamlapati railway station is named. The fort later passed to Dost Mohammad Khan, founder of Bhopal State. Today Ginnorgarh can only be reached on foot from the Delawadi side and is known for its birdlife.

Under the Nawabs and Begums of Bhopal, the hill forests south of the capital supplied timber and served as hunting grounds, as was common across princely Central India. Forest records suggest that hunting pressure on herbivores dates back to this era.

In 1888 the British official W. Kincaid made the first written mention of Bhimbetka, describing it as a Buddhist site. During the Second World War a prisoner-of-war camp was set up in this part of Central India; its remains are still visited by curious travellers.

In 1957 archaeologist V. S. Wakankar recognised the prehistoric importance of the Bhimbetka shelters after spotting the rock formations on a train journey. Excavations through the 1970s revealed the full scale of the site, and in 2003 the Rock Shelters of Bhimbetka were inscribed as a UNESCO World Heritage Site.

Following India’s Wildlife (Protection) Act of 1972, Ratapani was declared a wildlife sanctuary in 1976. The sanctuary covers about 824 km² of hills, plateaus and valleys in Raisen and Sehore districts, with teak covering roughly 55% of the forest.

The National Tiger Conservation Authority (NTCA) gave in-principle approval to make Ratapani a tiger reserve in 2008. After a wait of more than 16 years, the Madhya Pradesh government notified Ratapani Tiger Reserve on 2 December 2024, with a 763.8 km² core and a 507.7 km² buffer: 1,271.5 km² in total.

Ratapani became Madhya Pradesh’s eighth tiger reserve and India’s 57th. Jungle safaris for visitors had already begun in December 2022 from the Jhiri and Delawadi sides, and today tourists enter through three gates: Jhiri, Delawadi and Bhimbetka.