Jaipur: ‘Hathi Gaon’ yet to see a calf’s birth

JAIPUR: The country’s first elephant village, ‘Hathi Gaon’ as it is popularly called in Jaipur, is yet to see the birth of an elephant calf, despite the fact that it has been in existence since 2010.
India’s first and the world’s third elephant village that was developed for elephant welfare and tourism has failed to yield desired results. The reasons for this failure are many including pressure from the animal activists.
In the last nine years, although many healthy elephants witnessed breeding season but did not successfully mate to produce a calf. “Hathi Gaon has not witnessed any birth since it was developed. In 2007, the birth of an elephant calf cheered the mahout’s family and fellow villagers. The birth was a rare occurrence in Rajasthan in the last 100 years. However, that elephant too was not conceived here. The female elephant was already pregnant when it was brought here from Assam,” said Balu Khan, a mahout.
This year too, a 32 -year-old male, Ramu, is in the heat but is being kept separate from the females, killing any hopes of producing a calf. The mahouts claim that this is being done due to pressure from animal activists and NGOs. “We are fighting legal battles with NGOs since 2005. They allege we are being cruel with the pachyderm and want to separate us from the elephants. This is not true, for generations we have been living with elephants and treat them like our family members. Recently the Supreme Court ordered to give ownership of elephants to mahouts. We are hopeful that the village will flourish with calves,” said Khan.
At ‘Hathi Gaon’ there are a total of 105 elephants including four male elephants. Many alleged that mahouts purposely do not want females to conceive as this would affect their livelihood.
“Elephants have the longest gestation period of 24 months. Monthly expenditure by a mahout on an elephant is Rs 60,000. If a pregnant elephant is taken off the ride after one year, the owner will have to spend Rs 9 lakh just to feed the elephant,” said a local animal activist.