Forest officials offering pujas to trained elephants (kumkis) at Naniyala Elephant Camp near Kuppam in Chittoor district on Monday.
| Photo Credit: BY ARRANGEMENT
While the mention of Kanuma festival usually conjures up in one the images of domestic cattle getting worshipped, this time the forest officials in Chittoor district extended the honour to elephants too.
The officials worshipped the two kumkis(trained elephants) at the Naniyala Elephant Camp, near Ramakuppam, surrounded by the Koundinya wildlife sanctuary.
Forest watchers and mahouts in the camp gathered at the venue in the early hours and gave a bath to the kumkis and decorated them with flowers.
Unlike the regular days, the elephants were offered special dishes, made of jowar, bajra, and ragi. The varieties included sugarcane pieces and some leafy branches, procured from deep inside the forest and preferred by the wild tuskers, which are generally not accessible to the trained elephants.
Forest Range Officer (Kuppam) K. Madan Mohan Reddy said it was joyous to celebrate the Kanuma festival at the camp. “Our trained elephants play a crucial role in tackling the man-animal conflict whenever their wild counterparts move into human habitations. The mahouts also have developed a kind of inseparable bond with the kumkis,” he said. Meanwhile, several families in the hamlets nestled in the sanctuary zone offered prayers to wild elephants and symbolically to Lord Vinayaka, to save their crops jumbo herds.
K. Mani, a resident, said the villagers consider it a good omen if they spot wild herds on the Kanuma festival day. “Whether we sight them or not, we pray in our hearts that the wild elephants spare our crops. Women give harathi in the direction of forests as a mark of veneration to elephants,” he said.