Kalinga, the baby wild elephant who had created a milestone in the wildlife preservation efforts in the country by returning to its herd in the deep forests after remaining in human custody for more than 40 days has met its end.
The baby jumbo’s decomposed body was recovered on Sunday afternoon from the Bharatpur forests inside the Chandka elephant sanctuary near here. The death of the elephant calf has triggered shock among wildlife experts who had described the last month’s event – Kalinga’s return to its family in the wild – as the “rarest of rare” case.
“This is definitely an extremely painful development”, said the DFO, Chandka Forest Division, A K Patnaik who had played a key role in the baby jumbo’s return to the wild.
Kalinga’s story had begun in the first week of May when a herd of wild elephants strayed into Bhubaneswar and entered the premises of Kalinga Film Studio.
The herd returned to the sanctuary after 24 hours except the four-month-old jumbo. For the next 40 days, the elephant calf remained under the care of forest guards who named it as Kalinga as it was rescued from the premises of Kalinga studio.
The efforts to return the baby elephant to its herd in the wild had begun in the middle of last month.
“The forest guards who were monitoring its movement inside the elephant sanctuary had seen Kalinga for the last time on June 25. Therefore, we believe it could have died around that time”, said the DFO Mr Patnaik.
It is not yet clear what caused the baby jumbo’s death – the post mortem report is still awaited. However, forest officials said Kalinga could have succumbed to illness.
In fact, before the move to reunite the baby elephant with its family, some experts had expressed their apprehension about its survival in the wild as Kalinga’s eating habits had already changed while under the care of the forest guards.
Not accepted
The wild elephants usually do not accept the herd members who stay for long in close proximity of human beings. However, forest officials rule out the possibility of some herd members killing the baby elephant as Kalinga had already been accepted by the herd.
