National Park vs Tiger Reserve: A Protected Area and a Landscape Management Unit

Many famous tiger reserves, such as Corbett, Kanha and Ranthambore, contain national parks, so the two are often confused. A national park is a protected area declared under Section 35 of the Wild Life (Protection) Act, with no rights and no grazing. A tiger reserve is a management unit declared under Section 38V (Chapter IVB, inserted in 2006) on the recommendation of the National Tiger Conservation Authority, comprising an inviolate core (usually a national park or sanctuary) and a surrounding buffer where people and wildlife co-exist. The first is a legal status of an area; the second is a landscape plan for a species.

1. National Park

Under Section 35, the State Government may declare an area of sufficient ecological, faunal, floral, geomorphological or zoological significance as a national park. After settlement, no rights continue, no grazing is allowed (Section 35(7)), and destruction of wildlife or diversion of habitat requires a permit for the better management of wildlife (Section 35(6)). Boundaries may be altered only on the recommendation of the National Board for Wildlife (Section 35(5)). The first national park was Hailey National Park (1936), now Jim Corbett. National parks protect all wildlife in the area, not a particular species.

2. Tiger Reserve

Project Tiger was launched in 1973 with nine reserves. The 2006 amendment gave tiger reserves a statutory basis in Chapter IVB and created the NTCA (Section 38L). Under Section 38V(1), the State Government, on the recommendation of the NTCA, notifies an area as a tiger reserve. Under Section 38V(3), it prepares a Tiger Conservation Plan. Under Section 38V(4), the reserve includes:

• a core or critical tiger habitat: areas of national parks and sanctuaries that, on scientific and objective criteria, must be kept inviolate for tiger conservation, notified in consultation with an expert committee, without affecting the rights of Scheduled Tribes and forest dwellers except as provided; and
• a buffer or peripheral area: surrounding areas where a lesser degree of protection is required to ensure the integrity of the core and adequate dispersal, aimed at co-existence between wildlife and human activity, determined in consultation with the gram sabha and an expert committee.

Section 38V(5) permits relocation of people from core areas only on stringent conditions, including completion of rights recognition, a finding of irreversible damage, absence of co-existence options, a fair package and informed consent. The boundaries of a tiger reserve may be altered only on the NTCA's recommendation and NBWL approval (Section 38W). India now has more than fifty-five tiger reserves, and the All India Tiger Estimation is conducted every four years by the NTCA.

3. Key Differences

4. Issues and Case Law

Tiger reserves have been central to the tension between conservation and forest rights: relocation from core areas has often been poorly implemented, and Section 38V(5) and the Forest Rights Act now require voluntary, consent-based relocation. The Supreme Court has regulated tourism in tiger reserves, upholding NTCA guidelines that prohibit tourism infrastructure in core areas (Ajay Dubey v. National Tiger Conservation Authority, 2012), and in In re: Jim Corbett Tiger Reserve (Supreme Court, March 2024), it condemned illegal tree felling and construction for a tiger safari in the Corbett buffer, directed restoration, and set up an expert committee on safaris in buffer areas. Mining in or within one kilometre of national parks and sanctuaries (which form tiger reserve cores) is barred (Saranda, 2025).

5. Related Topics and Provisions