Tuesday, January 18, 2011

Majestic Elephants

This is a country run with Mega Mania Memorabilia (3 Ms) but unable to look after our majestic elephants.
Three years ago one of the tuskers was dead due to negligence and dehydration after a so called majestic pageant that paraded the hill country.
Then recently a giant tusker was dead in captivity and the popular story circulating round is he was let to die to get the tusks for ornamentation in high office.
Then comes the floods in the East.
A young dead elephant is trapped in a tree. First of a kind of news item and quite relevant in context.
That tells the sorry story of our majestic heritage and how we care.
It is an eye opener for the world if not for this blessed country.
We had 90% forest cover at the beginning of the last century and had over 60,000 elephants.
By mid last century the estimate was 6000 in the wild.
I do not believe we have 600 left in the wild now and the the forest cover is less that 20% now not enough to sustain vegetation let alone elephants.
We are going to commission two mega coal power units in the near future.
The forest cover will be reduced to 10% within a decade of their operation due to acid rain and the environmentalist are hiding behind the saffron clothed M.P.s.
Very soon we won't have a place in the jungle to meditate in quiet solitude.
Mega mania development will sacrifice the rest of the trees in the name of development efforts.
Very soon we have to import coconut timber with coconuts on top.
Last tsunami a few people survived by climbing on top of coconut trees.
We have mega floods after 53 years in the East and there are no coconut (palms) trees grown for 6 years after the tsunami to climb onto.
But we have election after election to elect representative who ruin this country.
Mega Mania Memorabilia at its best!
The carnival goes on!