Ali Jaramaray! Really, will we have elephants at the Kandy Perehera??:

 ..Or any other perehera for that matter....

Would you believe it? A total of ten elephants owned by the Maligawa is the only herd of tamed elephants in the whole Kandy district!! It reflects the elephantine proportions of having to face a situation of no elephants in pereheras....

by Shanika Sriyananda

Carrying the sacred tooth relics of Lord Buddha, in a carefully deposited special casket, the well trained tusker steps forward on 'pa wada' (white cloth for the tusker to tread on).

Beautifully dressed and decorated with colourful battery powered points of light, the tusker walks majestically. The huge body moves rhythmically to the drum beats. The 'king of the jungle' walking steadily carrying the sacred karanduwe does not leap forward until the man lays the pawada. He belongs to a gradually decreasing population of elephants, which has a close touch with humans. This tusker would be the last luckiest to carry the sacred karanduwe.

Soon, a horse will replace 'Raja' or 'Chandru', which carries the karanduwe. This may sound as an insult or a weird way of being faithful to the traditional perahera customs. But, the future of the country's domesticated pachyderms is grim and ---- no wonder that this age- old practice would probably be changed due to the rapidly dwindling population of tamed elephants??

So - horses carrying the sacred karanduwe or peraheras without elephants - the country will be left with these two options, in future if no proper plan is implemented to raise more human friendly elephants. The link between the king of the jungle and the perahera dates back to the ancient kings' times, and for ages parading the decorated elephants in perahera has become a tradition in this country.

But, a large herd of elephants walking majestically in a perehera is fast becoming 'a thing of the past'. We can only boast about the past - the way Gangaramaye Podi hamuduruwo deos already.

'' Over 169 elephants with 27 tuskers paraded through the streets of Colombo in the Gangaramaya Temple's annual perahera held in 1987. This may be the world's biggest pageant, which had such a big herd of elephants'', says Chief-incumbent of the Gangaramaya Temple Ven. Galaboda Gnanissara Thera recalling the 'golden days' of the Lankan tamed elephants.

This year, Gangaramaya perahera was concluded with 76 elephants, the majority hired from temples and owners from the far corners of the country.

The temple owned 12 elephants some years back, and now has only two.'' They died in their old-age and now it is very difficult to breed elephants due to several constraints'', says Ven. Gnaissara thera.

The Ven. Thera stressing the need for a state -sponsored programme to help the elephant owners, said the issue could be solved by capturing elephants from areas where the human-elephant conflict was rampant. '' People kill elephants in these areas and the innocent animals die for nothing.

There should be a programme to capture these elephants from the wild and tame them'', he adds.

He proposes handing over she elephants to the owners for a successful elephant breeding programme as many owners who owned these pachyderms stopped rearing elephants, as they did not have she- elephants.

Meanwhile, the Kelaniya Raja Maha Viharaya continues to train its nine-year-old tusker Kandula to carry the karanduwe. The famous Duruthu Perahera of the Viharaya is another casuality, due to the shortage of the elephants.

The Chief - incumbent of the Viharaya Dr. Ven. Kollupitiye Mahinda Sangarakitha Thera echoing the same grievance, says that before the 1980s there was no problem finding elephants for the perahera --- but today they have to go searching for elephants to populate the perahera.

" There are only 10 elephants in the siyane koralaya, which had over 80 in 1970's", Dr. Ven. Sangarakkitha Thera says, adding that only 39 elephants paraded in the perahera this time and the number keeps on decreasing every year.

He says the expenditure to transport these elephants from distant temples to Colombo is huge and holding peraheras will be a Herculean task in future.

Dr. Ven. Sangarakkitha Thera stresses the need of implementing an urgent programme to keep the elephant population going....

Breeding grounds

The practice is that, when all the elephants, which were transported from various areas of the country, are brought to the temple, the well built and tall among them will be hand picked to become the luckiest to carry the sacred karanduwe. This time, the tusker popular as 'nadum gamuwe atha' was selected to carry the casket of the Duruthu perahera of Kelaniya Raja Maha Viharaya.

Ven. Thera proposes a facility such as Pinnawela where all the tamed elephants are housed in one place, which also has breeding facilities. According to Dr. Ven Sangarakkitha Thera, this proposed facility could easily be converted into a tourist destination during off seasons and the animals can be released to temples to be used in temples during the perahera seasons.

After the death of 75-year-old 'Chandru', the 'vacancy' for a tusker remains unfilled for the last three-years for carrying the karanduwe in the Esala Perahera of the Bellanwilla Raja Maha Viharaya. "Chandru' was the only tusker for the entire Western province and now the province has to beg the services of the two tuskers belonging to the Gampaha District.

Peraheras with long parades of elephants have become memories of yester-years in every Raja Maha Viharaya, which hold annual colourful pageants. No exception for Bellanwila Raja Maha Viharaya, which is getting ready to hold its annual Esala Perahera on August 26.

Today, a perahera held with 105 elephants, including a large herd of tuskers in 1965, is just a mere record in the history books of the famous Viharaya. "This time only 50 elephants will be paraded and we gathered this amount of elephants with great difficulty", Chief-incumbent of the Bellanwila Raja Maha Viharaya Prof. Ven Bellanwila Wimalaratne thera says.

Stressing the need for taking urgent measures to increase the tamed elephants, Ven Wimalaratana thera says that if there is nothing done,, the country would have to face the difficulty of not having any cultural events, which give a prominent place to elephants, in the next decade. Elephants will vanish from our traditional ceremonies.

According to Prof. Ven. Wimalaratne thera, state intervention as in Thailand, Burma and India is needed for intance, elephants are handed over to temples which hold peraheras annually. "The other option is to implement a system to facilitate those who know the traditional methods of capturing wild elephants. Some of these violent wild elephants destroy villages and finally die in the hands of poachers and angry villagers", he adds.

Alternately, the government will have to initiate an exchange program to transport tamed elephants to Sri Lanka from India, Thailand and Burma.

Dwindling numbers

Prof. Ven. Wimalartne thera fears that the temples will face great difficulty in getting elephants, if the peraheras fall at the same time. " Some years back both the Bellanwila Esala Perahera and the Kandy Perahera were held simultaneously, but there was no problem securing elephants", he says.

Meanwhile, the President of Elephant Owners Association (EOA) and Diyawadana Nilame of the Dalada Maligawe, Kandy, Nilanga Dela Bandara says, the main problem of having a lesser number of tamed elephants is that the owners have no way out --- there is no permission to capture wild elephants.

He says, in 1950 there were 400 tamed elephants and this number dropped to 300 in 1980 and the country is left with less than 140 domesticated elephants today. Ten-years back, there were 100 elephants in the Kandy Perahera but the number dropped to 60 this year. A total of ten elephants owned by the Maligawa is the only herd of tamed elephants in the whole of Kandy district!!

He suggests, a wild elephant auctions, as at the 'panamurai eth gala' (auction place) in the 1950s. "Like during the late P.B. Kalugalle's time where the owners were allowed to capture wild elephants, a system of licensing is needed to be re-launched to solve this problem", he says-- warning that within the next five years the population of tamed elephants will drop to 40-50 as over a 100 of these elephants are over 60-years-of age.

He says, that the other major problem is securing females for breeding; for the last 25-years the owners were able to breed only four baby elphants. Out of the total population of tamed elephants there are only 10 she elephants in their fertile age.

According to Diyawadana Nilame Delabandara, it is time to use the traditional methods of taming these elephants coupled with the modern methods used in India, Thailand, Burma and US. He says that this practice should not be viewed wearing NGO blinkers. Those blinkered types say these elephants are being harmed in the process of taming.

Owning an elephant was prestigious for a family some years back, and now, it has become a 'problem' for those who already have elephants 'at home' due to a high monthly bill of as average Rs. 30,000 to feed an elephant.

"Some allege that the owners exploit these elephants round -the- clock by using them for hard work. But, with the modern equipment, there is less work for elephants. They are mainly used for safaris to promote tourism.

Aliyek ethi karala ada hamba karagena kanne be" (We cannot earn money by rearing elephants) he says adding that to maintain the elephants at Dalada Maligawa they spent over Rs. 500,000 monthly.

However, the Diyawadana Nilame claims that there is no proper registering system of tamed elephants by the Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWLC) and the present registry is merely a book. The application form for getting licenses is not printed properly and lack the important details.

The Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWLC) is the focal point for registering the domesticated elephants in the country. According to the DWLC registry, from the inception of the registry until 1993, the total number of tamed elephants is 174 and around 35 of them have died due to natural causes.

When we contacted a senior official of the DWLC, he claimed that the owners are not keen to maintain this registry though it is a gross violation of the Wildlife Act, which states, it is mandatory to register and renew the licenses of these domesticated animals.

"The Department has sent several warning letters but the owners who are politically powerful do not heed to the law", says the official.

According to the DWLC, over 50 per cent of these elephants are old and a handful of baby elepahts were born during this period. However, the Department is unaware of the exact number of baby elephants belonging to the owners since they have not notified the new births to the DWLC.

Under the Wildlife Act those who rear an elephant without registering or renewing the registration are liable to a heavy fine. Only 50 owners annually renew the licenses and others escape the law.

Meanwhile, the Department is planning to implement a programme to hand over wild elephants to owners, who can tame them.

However, if, a well designed programme to increase the domesticated elephant population is not implemented soon, tomorrow's children would have to go to museums -- or to browse the inter-net history pages --- to see the majestic pachyderms perform in the peraheras...