Wildlife Sanctuaries & National Parks

Discover Kaziranga, Manas, Dibru-Saikhowa and the incredible biodiversity of Northeast India

5 Sanctuaries

October to April (avoids the heaviest monsoon rainfall on the Garo plateau)

Balpakram National Park

Balpakram National Park sits in the South Garo Hills of Meghalaya, roughly 167 sq km of high plateau and deep gorge country at an altitude of about 910 metres. Established in 1987, the park takes its name from Garo mythology, where "Balpakram" translates roughly to "the land of perpetual wind," and the site holds deep cultural significance for the Garo people as the mythological resting place of departed spirits, making it as much a sacred landscape as a biodiversity reserve. Ecologically, Balpakram is considered one of India's biodiversity hotspots and forms part of the wider Garo Hills Conservation Area, a cluster of legally protected areas and reserved forests. Vegetation ranges from subtropical forest and grassland to bamboo stands and pockets of tropical deciduous cover, and the park is one of the few places in India where carnivorous plants such as pitcher plants and sundews (Drosera) grow in the wild, a reflection of the nutrient-poor, high-rainfall soils typical of the Garo Hills plateau. The park's wildlife list is unusually strong for its size: Asian elephants, tigers, gaur, clouded leopard, and the vulnerable red panda have all been recorded, alongside barking deer and the endangered wild water buffalo. The hoolock gibbon, India's only ape genus, is also present, giving Balpakram one of the more complete large-mammal assemblages remaining in Meghalaya. Balpakram remains comparatively under-visited next to Assam's flagship parks, in part because of its remote plateau location and limited tourist infrastructure, but that same remoteness is precisely why its forest cover and wildlife populations have stayed largely intact. For travellers already exploring Meghalaya's Garo Hills, it offers a genuinely different landscape from the state's better-known Khasi Hills waterfalls and root-bridge circuit: high grassland plateau, deep river gorges, and a strong living connection to Garo cultural belief.

South Garo Hills

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November to April (migratory bird season; the park is largely inaccessible during the monsoon due to flooding)

Dibru-Saikhowa National Park

Dibru-Saikhowa National Park sits in the floodplains of the Brahmaputra and Dibru rivers in Assam's Dibrugarh and Tinsukia districts, about 12 km north of Tinsukia town. Spanning roughly 340-425 sq km depending on the boundary survey cited, it is recognised as one of the world's significant biodiversity hotspots and was declared a UNESCO-designated Biosphere Reserve, one of the largest riverine biosphere reserves in India. The park was originally notified to protect the white-winged wood duck (Asarcornis scutulata), a globally endangered species that finds sanctuary in its swamps and semi-evergreen forest patches. Just as distinctive are its feral horses, a population of roughly 50 animals concentrated around the Churkey Chapori grasslands in the park's north, popularly believed to descend from army horses that escaped or were released during World War II supply operations through the region. Surveys have recorded 36 mammal species, 502 bird species, 104 fish species, 43 reptile species, 105 butterfly species, and around 680 plant species within the park. Primates include the Assamese macaque, rhesus macaque, and slow loris. The wetlands, particularly the adjoining Maguri-Motapung Beel, are a major wintering ground for migratory waterfowl, drawing birdwatchers alongside conservation researchers each cold season. Habitat here is unusually varied for a single protected area: tropical moist deciduous forest, tropical semi-evergreen forest, Salix swamp forest, moist evergreen patches, riverine grassland, and canebrake, shaped by the constantly shifting channels of the Brahmaputra and Dibru. Access is predominantly by country boat rather than jeep, since much of the park is riverine island and wetland terrain, giving a visit here a markedly different character from Assam's better-known dry-land parks like Kaziranga or Manas.

Tinsukia

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November to March (cooler, drier months; gibbon calls are most active in early morning)

Hoollongapar Gibbon Sanctuary

Hoollongapar Gibbon Sanctuary, about 19 km from Jorhat town in upper Assam, is the only protected area in India where the western hoolock gibbon and the Bengal slow loris can both be reliably spotted. Covering roughly 21 sq km, the sanctuary was declared in 1997, building on forest that had already been reserved decades earlier; it was previously known simply as Gibbon Wildlife Sanctuary before being renamed to reflect its signature species. The western hoolock gibbon is India's only ape species, and Hoollongapar holds one of the country's most accessible viewing populations, moving through the tall evergreen canopy in family groups and announcing themselves with loud, distinctive morning calls that carry across the forest. Sharing the same canopy is the nocturnal, slow-moving Bengal slow loris, a species far harder to see on a daytime visit but present in meaningful numbers within the sanctuary's core. Beyond the two headline primates, Hoollongapar supports stump-tailed macaque, eastern Assamese macaque, and capped langur, giving it one of the densest primate assemblages of any protected area in Northeast India. Larger mammals including tigers, jungle cats, Indian elephants, and wild boar also use the sanctuary, alongside a range of squirrel and civet species. The forest itself is a distinctive, tightly layered evergreen habitat: Hollong trees dominate the upper canopy, Nahar the middle layer, with evergreen shrubs and herbs forming the understorey. Because the sanctuary is a relatively small, isolated forest patch surrounded by tea estates and agricultural land, it is also an important case study in fragmented-habitat primate conservation, where the long-term survival of the gibbon population depends on maintaining canopy connectivity within a shrinking forest island.

Jorhat

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November to April (dry season)

Intanki National Park

Intanki National Park (also spelled Ntangki in some official Nagaland Forest Department references) lies in the Peren district of Nagaland, about 37 km from Dimapur town, making it one of the more accessible protected areas in the state given Dimapur's air and rail connections to Guwahati, Kolkata, Bengaluru, and Delhi. Established in 1993, the park covers roughly 202 sq km of tropical and sub-tropical forest on Nagaland's border with Assam. The park's wildlife list punches well above its size: hoolock gibbon, golden langur, clouded leopard, Asian elephant, wild buffalo, tiger, and sloth bear have all been recorded, alongside wild dogs and a healthy population of palm civets and flying squirrels. Birdlife is similarly strong, headlined by the rare Blyth's tragopan, a striking high-value species for birders, alongside hornbills and the black stork. Reptiles include monitor lizard and python. Forest cover is dominated by commercially and ecologically significant species including mahogany, rattan, bamboo, and stands of Khasi pine and Caribbean pine, reflecting Intanki's transition-zone position between the Brahmaputra valley lowlands and Nagaland's hill forests. This mix of habitats is part of why the park supports both lowland species typical of Assam's parks and hill-forest species more associated with the wider Naga hills. Compared to Nagaland's better-known Hornbill Festival tourism circuit around Kohima, Intanki remains a genuinely under-visited wildlife destination, offering visitors a realistic chance to combine a Dimapur stopover with a forest excursion rather than requiring a dedicated multi-day wildlife trip. Its position on the Assam-Nagaland border also makes it ecologically important as a corridor linking lowland and hill-forest wildlife populations across the two states.

Peren

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November to April (dry season; the sanctuary floods heavily during the monsoon)

Laokhowa-Burhachapori Wildlife Sanctuary

Laokhowa and Burhachapori are two adjoining wildlife sanctuaries on the southern bank of the Brahmaputra in Assam's Nagaon district, together forming a wildlife corridor between some of the state's most important protected areas: Kaziranga lies to the east, Orang and Pobitora to the west, Pakke-Nameri to the north, and the Karbi Anglong reserve forests to the south. Laokhowa alone covers about 70 sq km of riverine grassland and semi-evergreen forest, a landscape shaped by the Brahmaputra's shifting channels much like Kaziranga's. The sanctuary's most significant recent milestone is the natural return of the greater one-horned rhinoceros. Rhinos had been poached to local extinction here in the 1980s; in December 2023, two rhinos moved into the sanctuary of their own accord from neighbouring habitat, the first confirmed sighting of the species here in decades, and forest staff have monitored them closely since. Elephants, royal Bengal tigers, and Asiatic water buffalo also use the sanctuary, alongside barking deer, fishing cat, leopard cat, civet, and wild pig. Birdlife is a major draw: more than 225 species have been recorded, making the sanctuary an increasingly popular stop for birders visiting central Assam alongside Kaziranga. The wetlands and grasslands also support a breeding population of around 39 fish species, 9 amphibian species, and 14 reptile species, underlining how much of the sanctuary's ecological value sits below the waterline as well as above it. Because the rhino population here is newly re-established rather than long-standing, Laokhowa-Burhachapori offers a genuinely different visitor narrative from Assam's flagship parks: a conservation-recovery story still unfolding, rather than an already-stabilised population. Visitors interested in Assam's broader rhino-conservation landscape, not just Kaziranga's, will find this sanctuary a meaningful complement to a Kaziranga trip.

Nagaon

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