The largest zoo in the world

Vantara covers around 14 square kilometers of land in the far west of India, an area almost as large as the entire Munich Airport complex. Over the past five years, veterinary clinics, breeding stations, commercial kitchens, and outdoor enclosures have been built there, which are probably among the most modern facilities for animal husbandry in the world. The world's first elephant jacuzzi. The largest quarantine station for animals. The largest rescue center for leopards, with more than 250 living there. It is a project that can only be described in superlatives.

Only from above can the extent of the facility be seen. Enclosures line up next to enclosures. From above, the groups of buildings look surreal, almost like a holiday resort.

Vantara is financed by one of the richest people in the world. Mukesh Ambani is said to have a fortune of around 100 billion euros. The group of companies he has built up, Reliance Industries, is the largest in India in terms of revenue. Its business areas range from oil production and petrochemicals to textile manufacturing and media. The site on which Vantara was built also houses an oil refinery belonging to the group.

According to the latest annual report, Vantara is home to at least 10,000 wild animals of 330 species, including mammals, birds, reptiles, and amphibians. An impressive number. Berlin Zoo, which has one of the largest animal populations in the world, is home to around 2,500 individuals of these species.

What's more, the figures in the Indian annual report are seriously out of date, as they only go up to the end of March 2024.

According to research by the Süddeutsche Zeitung and the Venezuelan investigative media outlet Armando Info, at least 39,000 wild animals were delivered to Vantara by the end of December 2024, many of them in the past nine months. The journalists were able to evaluate import data that paints this current picture of the animal population in Vantara.

According to import data, animals were delivered to Vantara from 32 countries worldwide. From a total of 53 exporters.

According to the report, the most important export country is the United Arab Emirates, from where more than 11,000 animals were sent to Vantara, including endangered species such as 14 orangutans and a mountain gorilla. Thousands of wild animals were also exported to Vantara from Venezuela, including 142 giant anteaters and 101 giant otters. The Democratic Republic of Congo mainly supplied primates native to that country, including 100 owl-headed monkeys. According to the project's official annual reports, almost 5,000 animals also came to Vantara from India, including around 220 elephants and many leopards.

More than 39,000 animals – that is an incredible number. This would make Vantara by far the largest collection of wild animals in human hands that has ever existed.

And, of course, many questions arise: What do you want with so many animals? How do you care for them in a species-appropriate manner? And where do they come from?

According to research by the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, animals of protected species that were captured in the wild to be delivered to India may also have ended up in Vantara. In addition, numerous strictly protected species that may not be traded have found their way to India. This may be due to a loophole in international regulations governing trade in endangered species.

Two organizations are behind the zoo project and the Vantara umbrella brand: the Greens Zoological Rescue and Rehabilitation Center (GZRRC) and the Radhe Krishna Temple Elephant Welfare Trust (RKTEWT). Neither has commented on the origin of the animals or the animal population.

The SZ has inquired numerous times since July 2024 about visiting Vantara. In January 2025, they finally said that a visit would only be possible in a few months because new elephants had just arrived and had to be quarantined. They also said they needed “government approval” for such a visit, which couldn't be done on short notice. But why? Vantara is a private project and big enough that elephants in quarantine wouldn't be disturbed.

When the SZ sent detailed questions about the project in February, those responsible at Vantara insisted on answering them in person on site. A visit is now possible at short notice – but it will yield very different findings than expected.

Zoos such as those in Berlin and Cologne obtain many of their animals, especially endangered species, through conservation breeding programs initiated by the European Association of Zoos and Aquaria (EAZA). If a chimpanzee dies at Berlin Zoo, the zoo can request a new animal from the chimpanzee breeding program. A partner zoo is then looked for where a suitable animal is available, for example because it has had offspring. This keeps the chimpanzee population within EAZA zoos stable overall and ensures genetic exchange. Similar breeding programs also exist in other zoo associations worldwide.

Vantara and the organizations behind it are not yet members of EAZA, which also includes institutions outside Europe, and have not yet applied for membership. Nor have they yet applied for membership in the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA). The project advertises its collaboration with well-known conservation organizations such as WWF and IUCN, which publish the “Red List” of endangered species. However, both organizations deny cooperating with Vantara when asked by the SZ.

Vantara's story began in 2013 with the establishment of the RKTEWT as a sanctuary for working elephants from India. In 2019, the GZRRC was founded, which is now the core of Vantara. There are now also breeding programs for endangered species such as rhinos and king parrots. Research is being conducted. And part of the huge site is to be opened to visitors at some point. GZRRC is registered as a zoo.

The SZ took a particular look at the companies and organizations that, according to the data, have delivered thousands of animals to Vantara. These include numerous zoos, but also commercial animal dealers. They are based in countries such as Venezuela, the Democratic Republic of Congo (DR Congo) and Indonesia, which are considered hotspots for the illegal trade in wild animals captured there. And in the United Arab Emirates (UAE), an international hub and destination for this trade.

Daniela Freyer from the German species conservation organization Pro Wildlife, which is particularly active in combating the illegal trade in wild animals, is familiar with Vantara's import data. “The figures are astronomically high,” she says. “Many of the imported species are highly endangered or even critically endangered. An increase in demand can have fatal consequences for populations in the wild.”

Since species conservation and science are also supposed to be promoted at Vantara, animals may have been imported for conservation breeding or research. However, this is only permitted from other zoos, as required by Indian wildlife protection law, at least for protected species. Those responsible for Vantara confirmed this to the Asian news magazine Himal Southasian: “We do not treat animals as commodities and do not engage in commercial trade in animals.” They also claim to have nothing to do with wild captures.

Numerous species that appear in Vantara's import data are subject to an international trade ban anyway. This is regulated by the Washington Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, or CITES for short. The so-called Appendix I of CITES lists species that are particularly endangered and therefore strictly protected. Only animals born in captivity may be resold under certain conditions. CITES has been in force since 1975 and has been signed by 185 countries, including India. However, there are loopholes in this set of rules.

It is difficult to verify whether an alleged captive-bred animal was not actually caught in the wild. The national CITES authorities, which are usually subordinate to a country's environment ministry, are responsible for this. Exporters must also state the purpose of a transfer in their export permit if they wish to deliver a strictly protected species to another country. “T” stands for trade. “Z” stands for zoo, i.e., a transfer between two institutions that are registered as zoos.

Zoo transfers are also possible for strictly protected species. Trade transfers, on the other hand, are only possible in exceptional cases involving offspring. It therefore makes a difference whether an exporter is an animal dealer or a zoo. Sometimes they are both.

According to the data, Vantara's most significant animal supplier is an organization called Kangaroo Animals Shelter Center, or Kangaroo Animals Center, from the United Arab Emirates. The two names refer either to the same organization or to two that are directly linked. Based on its name, it appears to be a shelter for animals. The organization has a website advertising its mission to create a “better world for all animals.” It also offers photo safaris where visitors can take pictures of big cats. The alleged shelter therefore also appears to be a public zoo. However, much of the text on the website is dummy text, and the links lead nowhere. There is no visiting address, nor is there any indication that research or species conservation is carried out there.

According to research by the SZ, the organization is run by an animal dealer named Khaled Aldhaheri. On his Facebook page, Aldhaheri advertises an online animal trade called Ekat. There, dogs and cats are offered for sale, as well as wild animals such as gazelles. The Ekat website, in turn, has been registered by a company called Kangaroo Animals Trading. On an online marketplace where companies introduce themselves, it is described as an “importer and exporter” of live animals, founded in 2003, based in Abu Dhabi, contact person: Khaled Aldhaheri.

There are numerous other indications that Aldhaheri is behind both the commercial animal trading companies Ekat and Kangaroo Animals Trading and the alleged Kangaroo rescue center. The organization responded to a detailed inquiry from the SZ with only a general statement: “Khaled has been working with several organizations in the field of animal care and welfare for many years.” Khaled helps private individuals or institutions who are no longer able to care for their wild animals. All animal exports and imports are carried out in strict compliance with CITES rules. These are exclusively non-commercial transfers for which “not a single cent” has been paid or received.

Poachers often cause carnage

According to the national CITES authority in the UAE, the alleged kangaroo sanctuary is registered as a zoo. This means that transfers between zoos are possible. It is striking that, according to trade databases, the organization has so far only delivered animals to Vantara.

Among the exported animals are 41 chimpanzees and one bonobo. No animal is genetically closer to humans than this pygmy chimpanzee. Although both species are strictly protected, criminal gangs hunt them down in the wild. The hunters often leave a bloodbath behind, killing the adult animals in a group and taking only the young ones with them because they can be more easily accustomed to living in the villas of wealthy animal collectors. Great apes are kept as particularly exclusive pets, especially in the Gulf states, in countries such as Qatar, Kuwait, and the UAE, but also in China. The owners proudly show off their animals on Instagram and TikTok. According to a UN report, the price paid by end customers for a chimpanzee can be as high as 64,000 euros. Around 140,000 euros has even been paid for a gorilla.

How the great apes came into the possession of the alleged Kangaroo rescue center can only be guessed at. Transfers of protected animals must be reported by the exporting and importing countries to the CITES Secretariat, which coordinates the implementation of the species protection agreement. The data is publicly available. According to this, many of the chimpanzees are believed to originate from Iraq, Kuwait, Egypt, and Bahrain and were exported from there to the UAE in 2022 and 2023. How they ended up in these countries cannot be reconstructed.

“Big cats and great apes in particular are smuggled from African countries to the Gulf region,” says Daniel Stiles, who has been working on illegal animal trade for decades and has contributed to UN reports on the subject. There, the animals are kept in private zoos or sold on to Southeast Asia. This is a route that the bonobo could also have taken. According to the CITES database, there has only been one import of a bonobo into the UAE to date: in 2023 from Iraq. In turn, there are no records of any bonobos being imported into Iraq.

The alleged kangaroo rescue center does not respond to the SZ's questions about specific species, but responds in general terms: The animals were rescued from various sources – private owners, companies, and institutions that could no longer care for them. In addition, every animal exported was bred in captivity, which can be proven by CITES permits.

Even more striking is the transfer of a mountain gorilla from the UAE to Vantara. There is not a single known animal of this species – Gorilla beringei beringei – in captivity anywhere in the world. Zoos have lowland gorillas, of which there are still several hundred thousand in the wild. The number of mountain gorillas is estimated at around 1,000, living only in the densely forested slopes around the Virunga volcanoes in the DR Congo and neighboring Uganda.

The mountain gorilla that ended up in Vantara, according to the data, was exported to India by an organization called Capital Zoo Wildlife Park. In this case, too, the name and website give the impression that it is a zoo. According to the CITES authority in the UAE, the facility also has a zoo license. However, satellite images show only an elongated building in the desert sand at the address provided. If you call the phone number listed on the website to ask about opening hours, you actually get a response: “Our zoo is closed to the public until further notice.” And then no more questions are answered. The website of the alleged zoo was registered by Khaled Aldhaheri. So obviously by the animal dealer who is also behind the alleged kangaroo rescue center.

All transfers were carried out “in full compliance with international and national laws,” Capital Zoo Wildlife Park wrote in response to an inquiry from SZ. The CITES authority in the UAE confirms this.

The picture that emerges is that of an animal dealer who has set up several fake zoos that could be used to make the export of strictly protected species to Vantara possible on paper. But should a flagship project like Vantara rely on exporters who appear to want to conceal their trading activities? And on authorities that approve the export of a bonobo and a mountain gorilla to India? “It makes absolutely no sense to send a single animal of these species to a rescue center in India, far from its natural habitat,” says German primatologist Angela Meder. If they were indeed rescued animals, they should have been taken to one of the rescue centers in Africa where other members of their species live. “Because great apes are family animals that are only happy in groups.” The goal of any rescue must be to release the animals back into the wild.

A failed interview

At the beginning of March, the SZ finally visits Vantara. The reporter is picked up at the airport and driven through a dry, dusty landscape to a lush green oasis. Vantara is located in Gujarat, one of India's hottest states. At a five-star hotel on the Vantara site, visitors are asked to freshen up and then sign an NDA – a non-disclosure agreement. But why should they suddenly be forbidden from reporting on the visit? The whole purpose of the trip was to get answers to questions and form their own opinion. And to report on it.

After the SZ reporter refuses to sign the NDA, Vantara's managing director, Vivaan Karani, offers a tour of the animals anyway. The questions are to be clarified in an interview afterwards. The trip takes us past huge enclosures in an electric car, to the leopards, for example, which a keeper has trained so skillfully that they go to the fence and remain calm while he takes blood samples from them. The high standard of care can also be seen in one of the many kitchens, where tons of food are prepared every day on sparkling stainless steel tables. In a pantry, there are premixed feed buckets for the coming day, labeled with the names of individual animals. The vegetables and fruit are as crisp and varied as at a well-stocked supermarket counter. Some animals are even fed according to Ayurvedic principles, explains an employee.

The facilities and the efforts of the countless carers you encounter are as impressive as Vivaan Karani, the boss, had assured us in advance. About ten other employees accompany us on the tour, along with a press lawyer from Germany. Karani talks almost non-stop, while the others engage you in side discussions. You are frequently asked why you would accuse such a reputable organization as Vantara of wrongdoing. The atmosphere oscillates between back-slapping and relatively overt threats. At one point, the tour is about to be canceled because it is impossible to predict what the outcome of the investigation will be. Then, you are urged to extend your stay in order to gain an even better impression.

The mood changes dramatically when you ask Karani about the origin of the animals. Karani simply refers to the CITES papers that are available for each animal. At one point, he suggests that you contact the publishers of the SZ. After all, Reliance Industries, the Ambanis' parent company, is also a huge media conglomerate.

Around midnight, when the tour is over and the promised interview is about to begin, Karani suddenly cancels the interview because he claims the SZ is biased. A few days later, the GZRRC responds in writing, but does not address the SZ's specific questions: “Our facility operates in full compliance with all national laws, international treaties, and CITES regulations,” it says. “We are a non-profit, non-commercial organization dedicated to animal welfare and species conservation.” They had never bought or sold animals and would not do so in the future – a fact that had been confirmed by authorities and court rulings.

“The supply of wild animals has been bought up.”

Even with all the money in the world, it seems almost impossible to monitor the origin of more than 39,000 animals. To check whether these animals come from poachers and smugglers. Are those responsible behind Vantara aware of the hunting pressure and greed that their seemingly endless demand for endangered wild animals, which they believe must be saved, could unleash in the animals' countries of origin? Vantara does not comment on this either.

A European wildlife trader with good international connections, who asked not to be named for fear of jeopardizing his business, told the SZ: “No matter which other wholesalers I talk to, the supply of wild animals has been bought up. The lists of available animals are getting shorter because everything is going to India.” The wildlife trader said it was obvious that this demand was also leading to more wild animals being captured.