Photographs by Jody MacDonald Words by Kim Frank
Most mornings, they meet in the forest as the night sounds wane and crows of roosters mark daybreak. The black sky becomes a tinted blue, the white sharp shapes of the distant Himalaya poke out from the river mist that rises into the cool air and spills out over the nearby meadow.
Surya, a massive Asian elephant tusker, can hear Faridul, his lanky, soft-spoken mahout of over 14 years, long before he enters the single trail that winds into the protected forest at this national park in North Bengal, India.
They greet one another with a quiet knowing, stroke of hand, wag of tail. Surya kneels to the ground and patiently waits as Faridul makes a nimble climb up the hindquarters, settling on his broad back. The sun breaks through the clouds and the two wind their way, meeting up with the other elephants and men returning from night patrol.
A slim winding path through dense vegetation, the continuous tree canopy shelters from a sudden soft rain. Rain drops on fat leaves, branches cracking underfoot, the periodic soft calls of the mahouts: Meil, Meil, to move their charges along. Rustling overhead as trunks rise to pluck leaves along the way. Plodding feet, slow and deliberate.
They make their way toward the pilkana—or elephant shelter—just steps away from the stilted gear house that serves as a preparation center for journeys and patrols through the park. The building is constructed on pilings with roof overhangs to protect against the heavy rains and flooding during monsoon season. It contains all the mahout elephant tools, equipment, feed, and medical supplies. Several single room homes form a semi-circle, opening out into a grassy courtyard within a stone’s throw from both the staging and equipment building and the pilkana. Senior mahouts, patrol officers, and their families live here. Surrounded by forest on three sides and a short walk to the Murti river, this is the home base for the six elephants and twelve mahouts that work as a team for the West Bengal Forest Department.
Elephants, horses, camels, oxen, dogs, mules… Over the course of many millennia, humans have developed a complex synergy with certain intelligent, four-legged animals: a reliance on one another that has, at its root, the meeting of both of our most basic needs: food and shelter.
A delicate balance of co-existence, these relationships can be fraught with domination and cruelty, while in countless others there is an exchange of love and deep affection. Often, both; and always interdependence..
Human and animal partners have built empires together, traveled impassable terrain, staved off enemies, paired up to make a living, and assisted those that need mental, emotional or physical support. Just as wild horses have been captured and trained for equestrians as partners in sport or pageantry, and for cowboys to work on ranches and rangelands, wild Asian elephants have been captured and trained in India to work alongside humans for thousands of years. Historically, elephants have been objects of worship and ceremony, weapons of war, and employees of the logging industry.
Today, contemporary captive elephants continue to transport their human caretakers through impassable landscapes, acting as valuable partners for wildlife conservation and forest protection.
For over a century Forest Departments in India have employed elephants and mahouts for use in conservation and as a strategy to help mitigate the human-elephant conflict. Each elephant requires two full-time caretakers, a mahout and his apprentice—called the patawala—to meet their needs.
The traditional wisdom of mahout, passed down for generations within tight communities, involves deep and direct study of elephant behavior, knowledge of forest-grown medicines, meticulous attention to care and feeding, and a rich tradition of lullabies and soothing melodies.
As modern conservation laws in India have recently banned capturing and selling wild elephants, elephants used for logging, and most private ownership, economic opportunities for mahout families have significantly dwindled. Mahout families have been forced to seek other work and are no longer teaching the next generation of mahouts. Consequently, the Forest Department, one of the only entities that rely on captive elephants and take in orphaned throughout India are finding themselves in a crisis. As their need for experienced mahouts increases, those who hold the indigenous wisdom are becoming few and far between. Despite new mahout hires going through an in-depth training program, they often lack the generational wisdom and nuance that comes from being raised among elephants.
Many elephants working for the Forest Department were originally found orphaned, without their herd, starving and displaced. And while that helps explain why they are here, it does not make the fact that initial training can be cruel, and that their lives are not free, any easier to digest. Similarly, it is difficult to see the mahouts working around the clock for scant pay and lost social status, struggling to find time for their families.
Both elephant and mahout seem like outcasts, existing together on the margins of the modern era. There are no easy solutions or answers.
Today, the Forest Department still relies heavily on captive elephants as valuable members of anti-poaching and patrol teams, conservation research, and elephant conflict mitigation. For now, they remain a critical piece of the long- and short-term strategies being implemented to save the Asian elephant from extinction. The elephants are able to move silently through thick vegetation, carrying both their mahout handler and a Forest Department patrol safely lifted off the jungle floor. Together, these teams can travel deep into the forest where no vehicle can enter.
In this particular camp, in north Bengal, the patrol teams’ most critical role is to assess the health of the one-horned rhinoceros, for which this land is historically a breeding ground, thwarting poachers. In some cases the teams are also employed to expertly help drive out wild elephants herds from marauding, destroying crops, damaging homes, and killing people during cultivation season. For the six elephants and twelve mahouts of this elephant camp, the traditions are palpable, and elephant care is monitored through strict health and safety guidelines. Elephants, Forest Department staff, mahouts, and their families all live and work in the busy community, at odd hours to the tune of the elephants’ needs.
The pilkana at 5am is bustling with activity. The patawalas arrive on elephants carrying piles of grass stalks. Melodic short chants drift across the clean and well-raked protective space.
The calls are instructions in a language the elephant and mahout have been using to communicate for centuries. In what looks like a choreographed dance, Surya kneels on his back legs to allow grass bundles to slide effortlessly from his back, fanning out in exactly the right position at the front of his feeding station. Surya’s assistant mahout retrieves the buckets half-filled with a nutritional supplement of wild rice, rice syrup, and other natural ingredients. While elephants in this Forest Department camp spend much of their days and nights grazing relatively freely in the surrounding forest, this supplement is necessary. Gone are the vast swaths of rich forests abundant with the array of nutrition a herd of elephants optimally need.
Crouching next to the distinct piles of grass, metal bucket at his feet, the patawala takes handfuls of long grass, folds them in half, snaps each over the bucket edge, then pulls the conglomeration apart to make a rowboat-shaped container with long reeds trailing behind it.
With his hands, the patawala scoops out a precise serving of rice mixture and wraps the remaining grass to create a lid. To secure the bundle, two long strands are woven around the pod in an intricate tie that appears to have at least four variations. Faridul, Surya’s lead mahout, comes over to help.
The deeply personal bond between each elephant and their mahout caretaker is the most critical aspect for all of their work together.
If Faridul is only authoritative and the patawala the main source of all food, the delicate bond can become imbalanced. Besides, this tusker will consume about 20-30 pods twice a day. Just as soon as one is made, it is popped into the elephant’s mouth; eating the works of art as if they are handfuls of nuts.
I am mesmerized at their deftness.
Satish, a former construction worker and mahout to Saboney, one of the smallest elephants, calls me over to give it a try. I am eager to learn.
Fold, bend. “No. no,” he smiles and shakes his head. “Show me again,” I say and gesture as I do not speak Bengali. The rice sticks to my hands as I try to pack it into the lopsided bowl I’ve managed to make. Now for the tie.
It breaks, breaks again, and on the third try, it still comes undone.
Satish laughs and still takes the time. The mahouts don’t seem to mind that their hard work disappears so quickly. This ritual is an important part of the care and feeding cycle between mahout and elephant, just one of the many highly specialized techniques that have been passed down for generations within mahout families. Only after the elephants have eaten do the mahouts return to their families to eat their own breakfast before returning to work.
It is the end of August and the rains have been steady for days. Jody and I have been to this camp twice, once when the six tiny raised huts, with one double wood platform bed, held tourists.
And now, three months later, we are here during the monsoon season when the park is officially closed. Regardless, the elephant patrols and 24-hour care and feeding program must continue through the high waters and bouts of torrential rain. Jody MacDonald, a documentary photographer, and I have secured the necessary permissions to observe, document, and interview the mahouts and their charges during this season, and we are grateful to be here. We quickly unpack and gather our things to head to the river so that we can document and observe the daily bathing rituals. Life at this particular elephant camp has a routine cadence and a rotating schedule designed to protect the elephants with bouts of rest and limited hours of patrol.
Confident that we know the way, we start down the path. The trail is washed out and muddy. My flip flops kick mud behind me and suck into the ground. Ahead of us is the watchtower, a high sheltered wooden square that appears wildly unstable but which we are assured is solid (it has since been swept away). For now, the tower is perched on the banks of the Murti river. Once placid and peaceful, the river is now raging with only small areas of slower, safer eddies in the current for the mahouts to bathe the elephants.
We make our way, but what was once a rock stepping stream crossing is now knee-deep with small rapids. My choice of skirt is unfortunate, and it drags in the water despite my efforts to raise it without dropping my stuff. Eventually, I haul my sopping wet self up the two steep ladders into the shelter where five mahouts are playing a raucous game of cards while they wait for the patawalas to bring the elephants in from the forest where they have been spending much of the day eating and socializing with one another.
The rain is making the river tumultuous and at the first sight of the elephants, the mahouts stand and begin to pack up. Khurki knives hang from cords around their waists. Tucked into hand-carved sheaths, these long curved blades are good for everything from cutting grasses and stalks to filing tusks and nails. In each of their hands, a natural pumice stone to scrub and clean their elephants. The patawalas and elephants filter in a little at a time from different directions. Up the riverbank and out through the forest come Hilary and Diana. The mahouts explain that these females are best friends and often spend their free time chatting and snacking in close proximity.
Today, there is a farmer stranded across the river on the shore. He has a backpack and seems to have timed his appearance in the hope of catching a ride across. The river is far too treacherous for a human to attempt a swim. He is in luck, Suriya is approaching through the grasslands. The patawala and Surya help the farmer to climb on. At the deepest point, though the water covers the men’s feet, Surya moves with grace, agility, and strength. A strong wake of waves flanks his sides as he makes his way to shore.
Bath time is a highlight for both elephants and their mahouts. A time for games and socialization, the elephants soak and spray themselves in the river while the mahouts play cards on the bank; eyes seemingly in the backs of their heads as they periodically call out commands.
With no tourists for weeks, the mahouts seem less inhibited, yet the high water is cause for caution. The space available for the elephants to float and relax is limited to relatively small eddies. I am relieved to see that Raja, one of the smallest of the group, a young male with tiny nubs for tusks, is finally joining the others. Last time we were here he was not permitted this social hour and was tied to a nearby tree, only bathed after the others had left. He is acting like a bully, the mahouts had explained to us, disturbing the other elephants by poking at them and trying to pick fights. He must be separated so that they do not suffer from his unsocial behavior.
In the wild, herds are matriarchal, and primarily made up of females; only one male has a guaranteed role in the herd as a protector for the others. The female is the leader. Young bull elephants leave the herd once they reach their teen years. Sometimes they gather into a group with other males, but often they hang alone. These days, in the absence of reliable food and forest landscape to fulfill their needs, many solitary bulls now attach themselves to villages throughout the traditional migratory area, learning the comings and goings of each person who lives there and the timing of crop cultivation, to supplement his limited food source.
At this camp, it is the mature tusker Surya who appears to be in the role of male protector for the four females. Raja has had to re-adjust and apparently has succeeded as he is now back in the water with the others. True, he is still poking little Saboney with his trunk, trying to get her attention. But she just settles back under the water as if she is fast asleep and can’t be bothered. He eventually gives up.
Without highly specialized mahouts who practice the finely tuned art of devotion to their elephant, the fragile bonds between elephant and handler threaten to break down, putting both at risk. There is a rich canon dictating the care, guidance, and discipline that must be adhered to for the health and safety of both elephant and mahout.
In the absence of this indigenous wisdom being taught in real-time, specific guidebooks have been written, illustrating in astonishing detail the best practices in the entire gamut of captive elephant care and management. Men hired to be mahouts who have not had the experience of growing up with elephants, under direct training, over many years, run the risk of resorting to domination and violence to control their elephant. A mistake that can prove harmful to the animal, and ultimately deadly for the mahout.
For example, during one of my river observations, when the camp’s head mahout and his elephant were on brief leave, a young brash patawala who seemed to exude an air of malevolence, struck his elephant in a way that appeared to be unnecessarily cruel. I could not watch without coming away with a strong feeling that this man could eventually become a statistic with the elephant on the winning side. This thought is doubly sad because you can imagine that the elephant will be blamed, when in fact it is the human who is wholly responsible. The elephant in his care, and indeed all of them here, have the capacity in an instant to use their trunks to pluck and fling any human within reach to his or her death. And while they may have a foot temporarily tethered while in the pilkana, most of the time they are not tied up and their trunks are always free.
In stark contrast, Faridul, who trained as patawala to the well-respected guru Dinobunde before becoming full mahout to Surya, exhibits a calm, steady manner at all times. Once, the famed kunkie (specially trained elephant) Surya with Faridul at the helm and the Department’s beat officer behind him, clinging on for dear life, safely drove off a herd of over 100 elephants that had come to consume a nearby village’s crops. This is a common occurrence in maize cultivation season and, if not managed carefully, results in the injury or death of humans and elephants.
“I was not afraid,” Faridul says simply, his tall thin frame seemingly made of bird bones, belying his strength. “I trust Suriya completely.”
He is tending to large boil on Surya’s rear leg. Crouched alongside a large pot of water with healing herbs and medicine boiled over an open fire, Faridul soaks a compress. Wise mahouts would follow their sick or injured elephants into the jungle because they understand that the elephant will seek out the medicine they need within their habitat to heal what ails them. The mahout will then observe the natural healing and document the medicinal source, contributing to the indigenous knowledge of medicine that is still used today.
Faridul is 32 years old. He has a wife, a daughter, and an infant son. He has been with Suryia for 14 years, first as his patawala, and now as his mahout.
Mahout wisdom purports that an elephant picks up the temperament of his mahout, and vice versa. That, over time, the two mirror one another. Faridul and Surya are already living examples of this ancient adage.
“When Surya is happy, I am happy. When he is angry, I feel that way too. If he is unwell, it makes me the same,” Faridul says as he presses a hand to Surya’s girth. The conversation is clearly over as he bends to one knee beneath his elephant and with the concentration of a tightrope walker applies a compress to Surya’s leg. In turn, the elephant is patient, even kneeling on command, allowing Faridul to get deeper into the wound.
Today, with the human-elephant conflict in India at a fever pitch, desperate measures are being taken to protect both elephants and people.
While most will agree that, ideally, elephants should roam wild in the rich habitats that once stretched across Asia, with no human interference, that reality has long since passed. There are virtually no more uninterrupted swaths of abundant forests for the elephants to inhabit unmolested. While many square kilometers of natural forest have been protected in the form of national parks, offering a lush and protected oasis, they exist as poignant reminders of the scale of what has been lost.
Elephants are migratory animals and their needs are super-sized. An optimal home range for earth’s last giants averages 650 square kilometers, and can survive at a minimum of 200 square kilometers. Human encroachment has shrunk the existing range size to less than 150 square kilometers, forcing elephants to squeeze along the ancient migratory routes.
To shed insight on the dietary needs these habitats must fulfill, elephants eat around 10–15 percent of their body weight every day. This translates to upwards of 200 kilograms of vegetation and about 200 liters of water being consumed per day. There are only pockets of natural jungle interspersed among a variety of human-created blockages: tea gardens, villages, highways, trains, electric fencing, industrial buildings, army barracks.
Where once over 300,000 Asian elephants roamed throughout an uninterrupted landscape of lush forests, now approximately only 30,000 remain, forced to share depleted resources with other squeezed out wildlife and a still-growing mass of humanity.
Add the effects of climate change, with widespread drying up of traditional watering holes and streams, and the situation seems hopeless. Yet one beacon of hope is the restoration of vital corridors to link swaths of habitat toward the vision of creating a safe passage for elephants to roam.
In a cooperative effort spanning the country, the Wildlife Trust of India, in partnership with Elephant Family (founded by the late Mark Shand) has identified 101 corridors and is building partnerships with local grassroots organizations such as SPOAR in this particular region. Working toward strong results, efforts include creation of elephant-friendly tea gardens, relocation of conflict-ridden villages, lobbying to block development in elephant migration routes, and creating over and under wildlife pass-throughs over highways and railway lines.
While solutions like these cannot singularly restore the magnitude of what has been lost they can, and do, protect human and elephant lives.
Saving the endangered Asian elephant requires culturally appropriate, realistic, and ever-evolving solutions. In India, as part of a 4,000-year-old human-elephant relationship dynamic, there are thousands of working elephants still in captivity. Mahouts with specialized training, who are devoted to their elephants and supported with the economic and social status they deserve, offer the best chance for captive elephants to thrive.
Meanwhile, for the elephants and mahouts at this Forest Department camp, life follows a cadence, both daily and seasonally, with close to ideal environmental conditions: lush forest, a significant year-round water source, and a tight-knit community within a village that is not overcrowded. In the evenings, as the sun sets, the women come into the courtyard to socialize, while their children spin and chase one another around the grounds. The elephants rest and eat before night patrol, the mahouts have a quick break themselves. Faridul gives up his precious free time to talk with me.
I ask him, if he had so much money that he would never have to work another day in his life, would he still want to be a mahout? Faridul looks down and shakes his head with a shy smile.
“Yes, of course,” he says, “I will be with Surya for my entire life.”
Yet, when I ask if he plans to teach his son the art of mahout, his face clouds over and he looks out over the forest and pilkana, then back at me. “No,” he says. “It is too difficult a life. I do not wish that for my children.”
Faridul’s story, along with his fellow mahouts at this Forest Department base at the base of the Himalaya on the border of Bhutan, represents only a small component to the variety of co-existence solutions being employed by NGOs, researchers, tea gardens, individuals, and government entities across India. Yet, it is a mighty component: these particular elephants and their dedicated mahouts are partners serving on the front lines of an intense wildlife conflict.
One cannot help but feel that they are, perhaps, sacrificing individual freedom to guarantee the increased possibility of survival of both species. Let us hope their sacrifice will not be made in vain.
