Shankar, the lonely elephant: Will his new companions ease his stress?

It’s a status that’s likely to change soon for Shankar as the Delhi zoo is set to get him two female elephants, one each from Botswana and Zimbabwe, as companions.

Shankar, a diplomatic gift from Zimbabwe in 1996 to then Indian president Shankar Dayal Sharma, arrived in Delhi in 1998 with Vimbai, a female African elephant. But Vimbai died in 2001 and a young Shankar was left all alone.

Zoo Director Sanjeet Kumar said Shankar was initially moved to the enclosure of the Asian elephants but as he reached adolescence, in 2012, he was separated and kept in a specially built African Elephant Enclosure. Since then, he has stayed in isolation, away from the two Asian elephants in the zoo.

In 2010, the Delhi zoo wrote to parks in Africa seeking either a mate for Shankar or asking them to take him back. But the efforts yielded no results.

Shankar, 29, single and lonely. (Photo credit: Dr Abhijit Bhawal)

The decision to get companions for Shankar comes in the backdrop of the World Association of Zoos and Aquariums (WAZA) suspending the membership of the Delhi zoo for six months over concerns that Shankar was allegedly ill-treated while he was in ‘musth’ – an annual condition when bull elephants typically show aggressive and unpredictable behaviour due to a spike in their testosterone levels. Shankar, whose musth lasted from July to September this year, had been restrained during this period, leading to a chain burn injury and prompting authorities to tranquilise the animal. The injury and the resultant stress to the elephant had led to concerns from WAZA and animal experts about its alleged ill-treatment.

A senior Delhi zoo official said that though Shankar is in a separate enclosure, they have ensured that he has “visual contact” with the two Asian elephants in the zoo — Rajalakshmi and Hira Gaj. “We do not keep (the Asian and African) elephants in the same enclosure… in order to maintain species purity. But this does not mean Shankar is kept in isolation. When he was younger, we used to take him for walks with the Asian elephants. Though the enclosures are different now, Shankar is still occasionally taken for walks to take a look at the (Asian) elephants,” said the official.

Guidelines issued by the Central Zoo Authority (CZA) in 2013 say zoological parks must not keep animals single for more than six months and are expected to make arrangements to procure viable partners. “It is recommended to house elephants in small groups and not as single animals,” read the guidelines.

A companion for Shankar

Zoo authorities hope that with the expected arrival of the female elephants from Botswana and Zimbabwe, Shankar’s stress will reduce considerably with the “right social grouping”.

“The idea is not just to get a mate for Shankar, but a companion. We couldn’t have got male elephants because that would have caused infighting,” Director Kumar said.

Zoo authorities say they are now working towards welcoming the new members. Authorities in Zimbabwe have asked their counterparts in Delhi to specify their requirements for the new elephants, from the age group and weight to “certain ecological aspects”, Director Kumar said.

The Botswana government has also sought transportation expenses, which the Delhi zoo has pegged at Rs 80 lakh to Rs 1 crore.

The director added that as part of their efforts to ensure a smooth transition for the newcomers, the zoo is working towards getting regulatory approvals and seeking no-objection certificates, besides setting up quarantine facilities.

Shankar the elephant in the arena during pre-musth (Photo credit: Delhi Zoo)

“As per international protocols, the animal is trained up to a month before it can enter the transport crate. We will have to bear the additional costs for the trainers,” Kumar said.

The director also said that experts from South Africa and Vantara, an animal shelter in Gujarat’s Jamnagar run by the Reliance Foundation, are providing recommendations for the welfare of Shankar, especially on the question of how to handle him during his musth phase.

“We have been trying to get the elephants for months. It is only now, through the diplomatic efforts of the Union Minister (Mos, Environment, Forest and Climate Change Kirti Vardhan Singh), that the African zoos have agreed to send their animals. Now that they have agreed to donate, our focus will be on the positive enrichment needed for the socialisation of the animals,” said Dr Sanjay Shukla, member secretary of the CZA.

The zoo life

Experts, however, warned that introducing new elephants may not be the only solution to control Shankar’s aggression during periods of musth.

There have been several ethics-based arguments surrounding the upkeep of elephants in captivity in zoo systems.

“Captivity cannot accommodate who elephants truly are… Ethically speaking, it’s very difficult to fulfil the biological needs of musth for bull elephants in any kind of zoo management. It is a common misconception that every captive bull should be given a chance to breed during musth. In the wild, musth is an adaptation more for male-to-male aggression and dominance establishment,” said Kerala-based senior forest veterinary officer David Abraham.

According to Suparna Ganguly, research member of the Bengaluru-based Captive Elephant Research Team, “No amount of musth enclosures or arrangements can ever replicate a captive elephant’s need for autonomy and choices, that the wild can offer. Elephants in captivity are notoriously difficult to maintain… The most challenging is the bull elephant… One of the toughest to navigate is the musth state, which is a natural, biological phenomenon. However, in an effort to control, repress, delay or accelerate musth, the bull elephant in India is subject to untold tortures and agonies in captivity. Ganguly further argued that elephants are herd animals and “don’t always like any individual that is thrust upon them”.