Dera men take elephant around city

Neeraj Bagga

Advertisement

Tribune News Service

Amritsar, April 4

Although elephants are listed under the category 12-A of Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act proving that it is an animal facing the threat of extinction, yet they are taken around in the city by a group of people associated with a religious dera.

What perturbs aware citizens is that followers of a religious dera take the jumbo inside congested lanes of the walled city. They ask for money from people as an offering to the animal.

A concerned citizen, Surjit Sharma, who is a qualified disaster management expert, said, “It is extremely difficult to control an elephant if it runs amok in the densely populated area like the walled city.”

He added that it was advisable to keep an elephant in open place near the city, where the people interested in wildlife could visit frequently.

He said normally children were attracted to big animals. Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) honorary inspector Ashok Joshi said, “Elephant is threatened by habitat loss in general and Punjab in particular. Elephants are found in captivity in Punjab, but they are not found in forests, which are relatively small and sparsely spread across the state.

He said it was expensive to keep a jumbo on the SPCA premises. He recalled that around four years ago one elephant was brought to the SPCA shelter home. Eventually, the jumbo was released into the forest area as fodder worth Rs 2,000 had to be served to it per day.

District forest officer SK Sagar said, “The elephant is placed under the category 12-A of Schedule I of the Wildlife Protection Act. It proves that it is an animal facing the threat of extinction. As per the schedule an elephant can be domesticated after getting license from Chief Wildlife Warden of the state, or the District Forest Officer of the state Forest Department. The people who get license have to earmark the particular place to keep the animal. It cannot be taken to any other location.”