The Owner of a Thai Elephant Retreat on the Ethics of Elephant Tourism

After spending so much time on the water, I’m glad to be back on land and heading to the Phang Nga Elephant Park. It’s a small family-run operation in southern mainland Thailand that offers ethical elephant tourism. Jake Thaotad and his cousin Lek Songkaw set up the park in 2015 after Thaotad returned from London, England, where he was working as a microbiologist. Thaotad tells us that his family have been involved with elephants for 150 years and that helping domesticated elephants is paramount to their mission.

“We let our visitors interact with them in a way that isn’t exploitive,” he says. “It hurts me a lot when people say that all Thais are cruel to their elephants as it is simply untrue. But what we have to realize is that without tourism, elephant owners have no means to care for these wonderful animals. It is unrealistic to think that thousands of elephants can be homed in a handful of sanctuaries. And talk of turning them loose is unrealistic firstly because Thailand does not have the land and secondly because domesticated animals cannot be left to fend for themselves. So what I want is a world where healthy and contented elephants can be used but never abused.”


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Corbett search team fails to locate 'injured' elephant

Authorities of Corbett National Park conducted a search on Saturday for an “injured” elephant that was spotted in the park’s Jhirna range on Friday. They could not locate the elephant aged around 25-30 years within the park’s boundaries. The search was launched after a man posted a photo and video of the elephant on Facebook. A veterinary doctor was included in the search team to give immediate relief to the animal on being spotted. Apart from this, arrangements has been made for proper medical care of the animal, if it suffers from serious injury. “The elephant seems to have moved out of the Corbett National Park area and could have gone towards Amangarh.

However, the search is still on for sighting the animal and for providing it medical relief,” said Amit Verma, deputy director of Corbett National Park. He said the people who informed the forest department about the elephant, said it had a considerable limp suggesting that it was injured. It is being suspected that the elephant might have sustained injuries due to his leg banging on some object or on account of fight with a tiger..

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Man Crushed To Death While Taking Selfie With Elephant

A 30-year-old man was trampled to death by an elephant at the Bannerghatta Biological Park on Tuesday, after he and his friends sneaked into the park to take selfies with the elephant.

The New Indian Express reports that Tuesday is a holiday for the park, but Abhilash and his friends sneaked in and started taking selfies with Sundar the elephant.

The newspaper reported that two of the friends stayed near their bikes to drink alcohol, the other two began taking photos with Sundar.

A senior official at of the park told Bangalore Mirror, "He parked his bike near the Hakki-Pikki Colony located behind the BBP safari area and sneaked into the park illegally along with a couple of his friends. As he was reportedly clicking selfies in front the elephant named Sundar, it had attacked him and trampled him to death."

The New Indian Express reports that he Abhilash was the only son of a Bangalore Metropolitan Transport Corporation bus conductor, and was working with a company in Bangalore's Koramangala.

The man's parents have identified his body and the bike that was parked at Hakki-Pikki Colony.

Bangalore Mirror reports that the parents have lodged a complaint against the park because they were enraged about the lack of security there.

Selfie death are not uncommon in India. Earlier in May this year, a man was crushed to death while taking a selfie in front of an approaching train.

In another incident in March, a teenager was electrodcuted after coming in contact with a high tension wire while taking a selfie above a stationary goods train near Hazrat Nizamuddin railway station.

In fact, it was reported in 2016 that India had seen the highest number of selfie deaths in the entire world in 2015. Of at least 27 selfie death across the world, half were reportedly in India.

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Elephant corridor in Hassan gets a push

BENGALURU: The state government has decided to restore an elephant corridor cutting through Sakaleshpur and Alur taluks in Hassan district, in a project expected to cost more than Rs 230 crore. The corridor, which has become fragmented over the years, has emerged as a human-elephant conflict zone.

The project, known as Elephant Reserve or Park, has been in the pipeline for long.TOI has learned that forest minister B Ramanath Rai has now directed department officials to explore funding options for the project as it involves land acquisition in a few villages in the two taluks. A team from the Union forests ministry is expected to visit the proposed corridor area soon.

“The forest department is set to develop an elephant corridor spread over 22,000 hectares, including parcels of government land and private land close to a village called Hettur in Sakaleshpur taluk,” said Anur Reddy P, chief conservator of forests (wildlife).

Elephants in this part of the state, he said, were struggling to find forest space due to fragmentation of their habitat and therefore, frequently ended up in conflict situations with people.

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