Assam activists question transport of 21 captive elephants to Reliance-run Vantara in Gujarat

The group said the jumbos are being provided care as their owners are unable to take care of them due to financial constraints

Guwahati: Videos of at least 21 elephants being transported in animal ambulances from Arunachal Pradesh via Assam to a Reliance-run animal rescue and care centre in Gujarat, have left activists and opposition parties in Assam angry.

As television channels aired footage of the elephants, some raising their trunks over their enclosures, on Sunday and Monday, activists questioned why the animals were made to travel more than 3,500-kilometers.

Many suspected the jumbos to be from Assam but officials later said the captive elephants were being taken from Namsai in Arunachal Pradesh to Vantara, an animal rescue and rehabilitation centre run by Reliance Group at Jamnagar in Gujarat. The centre is under Radhe Krishna Temple Elephant Welfare Trust and is looked after by Reliance Group's Anant Ambani.   

The Assam Principal Chief Conservator of Forest (Wildlife) Vinay Gupta told DH on Monday that the captive elephants were transferred from Arunachal Pradesh with permission of a high powered committee appointed by Tripura High Court and the Supreme Court. The committee was constituted by Tripura High Court following a PIL filed in 2022 and its jurisdiction was extended to the rest of the country by the Supreme Court in March 2023. 

Captive elephants being transported from Arunachal Pradesh to Jamnagar in Gujarat.

A letter issued to Assam government said that the convoy started its journey from Namsai district in Arunachal Pradesh on January 18 and is likely to reach Jamnagar within seven to eight days, via Assam, Bengal, Bihar, Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.  

Vantara issued a statement on Monday evening stating that 20 elephants (10 males, eight females, one sub-adult and one calf) were rescued and were freed from exploitative logging industry in Arunachal Pradesh.

"This rescue operation, carried out with the approval of the High Powered Committee constituted by Tripura High Court and entrusted by the Supreme Court, has been conducted with the full consent of the current owners of the animals. The elephants will soon find their permanent home at Vantara, an environment that naturally mirrors their native habitat, where they will live chain-free and will never be forced into labor," said the statement. 

The statement also quoted Tabang Jamoh, the divisional forest officer, Namsai in which he said there are nearly 200 captive elephants in the state and DNA profiling is being done. "The transfer of the 20 elephants.....ensures their brighter future," the statement quoted Jamoh as saying. It also quoted one owner expressing happiness over transfer of the animal.  

Animal welfare activist Apurba Ballav Goswami of Golaghat in eastern Assam, however, questioned the transfer of the elephants with the promise of care and rehabilitation. "If Reliance Group is really worried about the welfare of such elephants, they should open such care centres in Assam and Arunachal Pradesh, instead of taking them so far away from their homes."

Goswami suggested that such captive elephants can also be engaged by the state forest department for tourist safari purposes in the national parks and wildlife sanctuaries. "This will bring revenue to the state exchequer and help in proper care and wellbeing of the animals. The state government must take this responsibility instead of allowing the elephants to go into a corporate group's hands," Goswami said. "We have information that many animals have similarly been transported from Assam too."

Assam MLA, Akhil Gogoi of Raijor Dal, an opposition party, slammed the BJP-led government for allowing the animals to be transported to Gujarat. "Not a single animal should be taken out of the region. The government must bring all those back and take responsibility for their welfare."   

Most of these captive elephants were used in logging activities but they became jobless after the Supreme Court banned tree felling in forests in 1996. According to an estimate, there are nearly 900 captive elephants in Assam.