THE ELEPHANT TRANSIT HOME AT UDA WALAWE:

A Jewel in the Crown of Sri Lankan Conservation

- BY ROHAN WIJESINHA

Born free...and wild...to a devoted mother who would sacrifice her life for you, and to others of your kind who would do their utmost to protect you.

Free to roam over vast spaces wherever the group took you, learning, feeding, playing, and doing whatever a young elephant is born to do. Suddenly, without any warning, whether gunshot, explosion or electrocution or poison or accident, and it all disappears in brief, confusing, painful moments, and you are alone apart from being surrounded by a noisy throng of beings you had been taught to fear. Mother is now a lifeless or dying heap on the ground; protective siblings, aunts, and cousins have disappeared, either in terror or hopelessness; today has become a living nightmare. What? Why? Who? Where? What was once filled with the promise of future has suddenly come to an end. Welcome to the suffering of an elephant orphan.

A light in the darkness

The recent history of the Department of Wildlife Conservation (DWC) has little to commend it. In mitigation, however, they are under the directive of politicians who have little or no technical expertise. There is little else to be said on this that has not already been highlighted in the media.

There is, however, one shining light in conservation that the DWC must have credit for; a trailblazing initiative of its history one that is not only a tribute to the principles of conservation but also to the humanity of those who founded it. This gem is the Elephant Transit Home (ETH) on the boundary of the Uda Walawe National Park.