M F AHMAD
Daltonganj, Aug 20: Open irrigational wells in Jharkhand have seen calves of elephants or even elephants, in a few cases, falling in them. If the success rate is to be analysed, then their retrieval from the wells has been consistently good pan Jharkhand.
This outgoing week, a female calf fell in a 10-feet deep irrigational well in the Khunti district forest division. It was retrieved by men and machine (read JCB).
Everyone had a word of praise for the team of forest officials who safely pulled out the female calf from inside the water-filled well.
Lagatar24.com correspondent spoke to DFO Khunti Kuldeep Meena, IFS, to know how the mother of the calf and other elephants reacted to the situation.
Kuldeep Meena said, “In the beginning, the mother elephant and one more of her clan were very aggressive and suspicious of something bad coming to the calf in the well as the crowd of onlookers was swelling with time. We were cross-fingered and determined to pull up the calf and at the same time, we were ensuring that none of our members of the rescue team including the driving crew of the two JCB machines had any problem with the mother elephant and her companion as the two elephants had little trust in us then.”
“However, when our two JCB machines arrived at the site, the mother elephant and her companion got a feeling perhaps of their calf being rescued. The two elephants retreated to give the rescue team and JCB machines crew to work at peace and not to fear them anymore,” guessed the IFS officer.
The calf was taken out of the well and it soon joined the mother for a journey into the forest. Kuldeep Meena said the female calf must have been in the confined water of the well for hours as nobody knew when it fell into the well. She had no physical disability as once it was taken out, she ran towards her mother.
The two elephants have given a lesson here. Let rescue operations be carried out with peace of mind and not of any threat to life. The elephants understand and follow it but not the human beings.
The crowd of people in such a situation where any wildlife is in distress further adds to the miseries of the animal in distress. Their panic and trauma increase due to the noises raised by the crowd of onlookers.
“Rescuing any wildlife appears to be an adventure for a common man but for us, it is a serious exercise where odds remain too heavy and results of the rescue may go any side,” said Kuldeep Meena.
