The Indian wolf may finally have found its place under the savanna sun. This beleaguered species has been a mute witness to the quiet crisis unfolding across our grasslands. Scientists and conservationists have for decades howled on its behalf with a simple plea: that India must grant legitimacy to its savanna grasslands and recognise the intricate dependencies between people and predators that inhabit them. Last week, that warning found a new echo. The International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) released an update that, for the first time, evaluated the Indian wolf separately from the grey wolf. It listed it as vulnerable, acknowledging what scientists have long suspected, that this is an ancient, distinct lineage found only in the Indian subcontinent, with barely 3,000 individuals left in the wild. It is a recognition that comes at an important moment, albeit a little late. Because what threatens the Indian wolf is not just persecution or disease, but the way we have chosen to classify its home.
The erasure begins on paper. Less than 15% of the Indian wolf’s range falls within protected areas. The rest lies scattered across a mosaic of croplands, grazing pastures, and scrub, the same lands that our official records still call wastelands. That one word has shaped the destiny of both wolves and the landscapes they inhabit. For decades, and strongly influenced by the British architecture, India’s conservation frameworks have been guided by a forest-centric imagination--one that equates ecological value with tree cover. In doing so, we have systematically erased the open natural ecosystems that cover large parts of the Deccan, Saurashtra, central India, and the semi-arid plains of Rajasthan.
These are not degraded lands waiting to be greened. They are functioning ecosystems, shaped by geography, climate, and people. They sustain a diversity of species adapted to heat, and drought, and offer open spaces for blackbuck, chinkara, caracal, foxes, bustards, and wolves, and pastoral communities who have grazed these lands for centuries. Yet, in the policy imagination, their openness is seen as emptiness. It makes them targets for everything from intensive agriculture, solar farms, and tree-planting drives. Every time a district plan seeks to “develop” fallow or scrubland, it is the wolf’s habitat that disappears under a new label.
The Indian wolf’s survival depends on coexistence rather than isolation. For generations, wolves and pastoralists shared the same landscape, their interactions mediated by culture and customary tolerance. The Dhangars of Maharashtra, for instance, worship the wolf, seeing it as both a threat and protector of their flocks. But as pastures shrink, prey species decline, and land-use pressures mount, that coexistence is rapidly fraying.
{{/usCountry}}The Indian wolf’s survival depends on coexistence rather than isolation. For generations, wolves and pastoralists shared the same landscape, their interactions mediated by culture and customary tolerance. The Dhangars of Maharashtra, for instance, worship the wolf, seeing it as both a threat and protector of their flocks. But as pastures shrink, prey species decline, and land-use pressures mount, that coexistence is rapidly fraying.
{{/usCountry}}Wolves turn more frequently to livestock, leading to conflict. We often respond with compensation, but not with conservation. Without policy recognition of grasslands, there is no mechanism to protect the ecological commons on which both herders and wolves depend.
Diseases like canine distemper, spreading from unvaccinated village dogs, add another layer of threat. Genetic dilution through dog-wolf hybridisation has been recorded in parts of central India. These are not isolated problems, they are symptoms of the same underlying condition: fragmentation, invisibility, and neglect of open natural ecosystems.
The IUCN’s listing is a reminder that conservation cannot remain forest-bound. If we are to halt biodiversity decline, we must start by reforming how India classifies and governs its land.
First, we must retire the word wasteland from our policy vocabulary. It is neither scientifically accurate nor ecologically neutral. Terms such as grasslands, savannas, scrub, and fallows better describe the diversity of open ecosystems and can guide appropriate management. Updating the Wasteland Atlas of India to reflect this would be an important signal of intent.
Second, national and state biodiversity planning must explicitly include open natural ecosystems (ONEs).
Third, India’s restoration ambitions under the UN Decade on Ecosystem Restoration and the UN Convention to Combat Desertification should go beyond tree planting. Restoration in these landscapes must prioritise native grasses, soil health, and water retention rather than canopy cover.
Finally, any vision for conserving the Indian wolf must centre the communities that live alongside it. Investing in pastoral economies, ensuring access to commons, and embedding coexistence models in rural development programmes will be as crucial as scientific monitoring.
The danger today lies in a paradox of perception. In our pursuit of “greening” India, we risk destroying the very landscapes that sustain its oldest lineages of life. The Indian wolf’s story exposes this contradiction: that not all green is good, and not all open is barren. These landscapes are carbon sinks, wildlife corridors, and livelihood systems; just not the kind we are used to recognising.
Conservation often begins with language. What we call land determines what we think it is worth. When we describe an ecosystem as degraded, we legitimise its destruction. When we call it natural, we invite protection and management.
Reclassifying India’s open lands is therefore more than a technical exercise; it is an act of ecological justice. It is about recognising that these are not spaces waiting for improvement, but living systems whose value lies precisely in their openness. If the Indian wolf now has a new global identity, not just a subspecies but potentially a species of its own, then India too must find a new language for the landscapes it inhabits.
The wolves we wrote about in 2022, who lived on the outskirts of Pune city, did not survive a disease outbreak that followed. But their story remains a reminder that these are not animals of wilderness; they are citizens of shared, human-dominated landscapes.
Whether the next generation of wolves will survive depends less on forest policies and more on land policies, on how we map, name, and manage the grasslands under their feet.
The IUCN listing gives us a chance to begin again. It asks us to correct not just how we value wolves, but how we value land.
This article is authored by Anuja Malhotra, policy manager and Abi T. Vanak, director, Centre for Policy Design, ATREE.