{"id":118985,"date":"2021-10-07T17:02:54","date_gmt":"2021-10-08T00:02:54","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/?p=118985"},"modified":"2021-10-13T14:13:05","modified_gmt":"2021-10-13T21:13:05","slug":"the-elephant-in-sri-lanka-part-12","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/2021\/10\/07\/the-elephant-in-sri-lanka-part-12\/","title":{"rendered":"THE ELEPHANT IN SRI LANKA Part 12"},"content":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS<\/em><\/span><\/h2>\n\n\n

revised 12.10.21<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Certain\nelephant NGOs have focused exclusively on the perahera elephant. It was\nreported in 2044 that the donation of mature male elephants\nto selected temples had met with loud protests from NGOs. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ven. Deranagama Kusaladamma of Sri Sambodhi vihara, Colombo said the Viharaya\nhas been prevented from holding its seventh annual Perahera in 2016 because\nNGOs and a recently appointed Director General of the Wildlife Department were taking\naction to   prevent the Perahera\nactivities of the temples. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Buddhists responded. Several foreign funded NGOs in\nSri Lanka are trying to discourage the Perahera tradition in temples while\nmasquerading as protectors of elephants,\u201d they said. It is\na sinister,\npolitically motivated move\u2019 by several NGOs, masquerading as protectors of elephants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

There is an\nopen  campaign to obstruct the Kandy Esala Perahera on the grounds of\nviolation of animal rights and harassment of elephants taking part. This is yet\nanother indication of the deep animosity towards Buddhism harbored by non-Buddhists in Sri Lanka.\nBut this is the first time that peraheras, specially, the Esala Perahera has\nbeen targeted. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Ven.\nBellanwila Wimalaratne said that NGOs\nprotest anything that forms part of our cultural tradition. The perahera\nculture is an integral part of the Sinhala Buddhist heritage and it could not\nbe terminated just because animal rights are against using elephants in\nprocession.  Those who claim to defend\nthe rights of elephants do nothing for the welfare of these animals. They have\nnot spent a cent to feed them. The NGOs are not interested in\nprotecting the fowls, pigs and cows that are killed each day. Why don\u2019t they resist sale of cattle for\nslaughter, also horses used in racing. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Elephants in this country have\nbeen well looked after and cared for by the Buddhist monks for many centuries\nbefore the NGOs came here with their foreign funds, the Sangha said.  F<\/strong>rom\nancient  times,  Heads of State have gifted elephants to\ntemples. Myanmar, Burma and Thailand have also \ngifted  elephants to temples as\ndiplomatic  gesture.. John Amaratunga, Minister for Christian\naffairs ,gifted a baby elephant to Purana vihara of Hendala in 2003 to mark his\n25 years in politics. Buddhist temples have traditionally looked after the  baby elephants gifted to them. .  <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Currently, there are around 150 domesticated elephants in Sri Lanka.\nA practical programme  has been\nimplemented to look into the welfare of domesticated elephants,\u201d said Tamed\nElephant Owners Association President Nilanga Dela in 2021. It is only the\nelephant owners who know about these methods and not animal rights activists. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Removing elephants from \n\u2018peraheras\u2019  did not  turn out the way the NGOs hoped. In 2016, The\nCabinet    decided to withdraw its ban on\nthe adoption of baby elephants. Cabinet\ngranted approval for the adoption of baby elephants by individuals and\nreligious places under specific conditions. They could be\nused in Perahera and religious processions. Individuals wishing to adopt an\nelephant will have to pay  10 million\nrupees while temples will get them for free. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The temple authorities\nnow find it impossible to fill a perahera by collecting elephants from all\nover. Those elephants are no  more. It was now necessary to create a pool of  trained elephant  in a single location, to be used for this once\na year walk. This is clearly an activity which must come under the Maha Sangha.\n<\/p>\n\n\n\n

This idea had been \ndiscussed by the Diyawadana Nilame in the 1990s. It was\nplanned to breed and train elephants that belonged to the Maligawa, other\ntemples and private owners on land provided by the Maligawa. 3 years were\nneeded to train an elephant or a tusker to take part in a perahera. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The land for\nsuch a project should not be less than 100 acres and should have diverse\nterrain and good soil, allowing a natural environment for these elephants.\nThere should be large trees to provide shade and a stream or a river close by.\nThere would be a need to create grasslands as fodder and an unproductive\nfarmland will be the ideal, said experts. the project did not materialize.  If they had launched the project as planned in\nthe 1990s by now there would have been an adequate number of elephants they\nsaid.<\/p>\n\n\n\n

A cabinet paper was  drafted\nin 2004 where it was suggested that male tuskers at the Pinnawela Elephant\nOrphanage could be trained and sent  for\nperaheras without using domestic elephants. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Instead In July 2016, Cabinet approved  the maintaining\nof  a pool of elephants, for  participation in cultural activities  as a government activity..  \u2019The perahera culture of Sri Lanka has a great\nhistory and has attracted the world\u2019s attention. It is essential to use elephants\nin peraheras,\u201d Cabinet said. A pool of about 35 elephants consisting of about 35 tuskers, and female\nelephants will be  created under\nthe Zoological Department with elephants obtained from Pinnawela Elephant\nOrphanage and from Udawalawe Eth Athuru Sevana, with the objective of training\nfor perahera purposes. Mahouts too will\nbe trained at the facility on how \u2018to treat the animals in the correct\nmanner.” <\/p>\n\n\n\n

In March 2021\nThe Maha Sangha met President Gotabaya Rajapaksa to discuss the issue of\nperahera elephants. The  team included\nAnunayake of the Asgiriya Chapter, chief \nincumbent of Tissamaharama , Kelaniya \nand Gangarama Temples, the Diyawadana Nilame and President of the Tamed\nElephant Owners Association. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

The\ndelegation pointed out that Perahera is \npart of the indigenous heritage and the Maha Sangha and the government\nare responsible for upholding and preserving this heritage. Remnants of  the indigenous elephant culture still\nremained. The tradition of conducting religious rites after the death of\nelephants still exists today, the delegation said..But there is now a\nsubstantial shortage of trained elephants for Peraheras. About 80 of the available\nelephants  are now over 50 years of age. There\nis a need for a short term and long plan for this matter. ( Continued)<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

KAMALIKA PIERIS revised 12.10.21 Certain elephant NGOs have focused exclusively on the perahera elephant. It was reported in 2044 that the donation of mature male elephants to selected temples had met with loud protests from NGOs. Ven. Deranagama Kusaladamma of Sri Sambodhi vihara, Colombo said the Viharaya has been prevented from holding its seventh annual […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":true,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[104],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-118985","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-kamalika-pieris"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118985","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=118985"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/118985\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=118985"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=118985"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.lankaweb.com\/news\/items\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=118985"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}