Kaziranga: A suckling elephant calf was rescued from a tea garden after his mother, wedged in a 2 ft wide drain, died in tragic circumstances. This has raised the count of elephants at the Centre for Wildlife Rehabilitation and Conservation (CWRC) to seven.

The magnificent adult cow elephant, almost 12 feet tall, and her year old male calf, were almost buried alive in a 2 x 15 ft irrigation drain in Numaligarh tea estate on the foothills of Karbi-Anglong, District Golaghat, in the north eastern state of Assam on the night of the 18th. The CWRC team had reached the spot the same morning after receiving a phone call from N.K. Vasu, Director, Kaziranga National Park .

“It was an agonizing scene that I saw there. The mother elephant was wedged in a narrow drain unable to move in any direction. The drain was so narrow that it was pressing her diaphragm from both sides and as a result her breathing was labored. The calf was caught in the slush under her forelegs and was in agony!” Dr Murali Pai, regional manager, North East, said.

Dr Pai tranquilized the mother and as sedation set in, jumped into the drain with elephant keeper, Tarun Gogoi, and tried to extricate the calf. Unfortunately, even as the calf freed itself and the team could start digging to widen the drain, the mother died.

“The calf, which had freed itself from his mother’s weight now charged the team and further wedged himself in another narrow portion of the drain. After many desperate attempts to free it with some help, it finally freed himself and climbed to safety using a ramp-like structure that had been made at the other end of the drain. Mr. Vasu had joined us half-way during the rescue and greatly inspired us with his wise counsel and vast experience in such cases”, Dr Pai reported.

According to the estate manager, Vikas Joshi, the cow elephant must have slipped in the drain with her calf while crossing a steep slope nearby “and then got wedged into the irrigation drain that was barely 2 ft wide trying to escape.”

The calf reached CWRC at around 2 pm after the rescue operation that lasted almost three and a half hours. “It is settling well with the other calves and feeding,” Dr Pai said.

The rapid increase in the number of elephants to seven at CWRC has led to a major financial crunch in terms of food. The Elephant food bill itself is around Rs 50,000 (over $ 1000) per month.

Situated adjacent to the Kaziranga National Park, Assam, CWRC was founded by the Assam Forest Department and Wildlife Trust of India (WTI) with support from WTI’s partner, the International Fund for Animal Welfare (IFAW). CWRC is a systematic and scientific initiative to deal with wild animals in distress where immediate human intervention is required for their survival.