Features

Nadungamuwe Raja, a prisoner of culture, an ambassador of culture or rather, an ambassador of conservation?

Published

4 years ago

2022/03/14

By Manasee Weerathunga

It is no doubt that the passing away of the ceremonial tusker Nadungamuwe Raja was sorrowful news to the entire country, regardless of religions and ethnicities. It is highly unlikely that there could have been any Sri Lankan who did not love this gentle giant for his majesty and tranquility. However, the question at which everyone who loved Nadungamuwe Raja becomes divided, is on whether Nadungamuwe Raja lived a life of grandeur or a life of suffering?

Nadungamuwe Raja is best known as the ceremonial tusker, bearing the main casket of the Tooth Relic of Lord Buddha in the annual procession of Esala, in Kandy, Sri Lanka. As in ancient traditions, it is only a male tusker of remarkable physique that is eligible for bearing the casket of the Tooth Relic. It is this majesty of this beast which prompted many Sri Lankans, especially the devout Buddhists, to place Nadungamuwe Raja, up on a pedestal of sanctitude. In the eyes of devout Buddhists, Nadungamuwe Raja was not only privileged enough to bear the casket of the Tooth Relic of Lord Buddha (something which is not approachable to a layman) but also was able to gather a plethora of merit in this lifetime, for the rest of Samsara, by being in service to the Lord Buddha. However, in the eyes of animal lovers and workers for animal rights, Nadungamuwe Raja was a prisoner of culture and blind religious devoutation, having had lived a life, chained in a domestic setting with no access to the natural habitat of an elephant or its co-inhabitants.

The opulent pair of long, intersecting pair of tusks can be named as the crowning glory of Nadungamuwe Raja, not to mention that he was the tallest domestic elephant known in whole Asia. In addition to these unmistaken resplendent features of Nadungamuwe Raja, the placidity of this beast’s nature, points out some facts noteworthy about elephants. Asian elephants, the species to which Nadungamuwe Raja belongs, differ from their African elephant cousins, with respect to several features. Firstly, Asian elephants are of significantly smaller build in comparison to African elephants, which makes the height of Nadungamuwe Raja, remarkable. Secondly, unlike the African elephant, which possesses tusks in both male and female alike, tusks are a rarity found in some male Asian elephants only, ticking off another box for Nadungamuwe Raja’s exceptionality. Thirdly, domesticated African elephants are unheard of because they do not share the serene demeanor of their Asian counterparts, while Nadungamuwe Raja is only one of the many domestic Asian elephants found in several countries of Asia.

However, domestication of animals is not something which is discrete for a region of the world. The history of animal domestication spans as far as the beginning of human civilization. The pre-historic man of Stone Age was in the habit of chasing and hunting the animals they wanted to fulfill their food requirements, and then moving to a new location once he had exploited all the animals in his surrounding location. However, as the humans moved on to the farming age by growing their food in their locality and forming permanent settlements, they realized that rather than going in search of animals to hunt, holding the animals in captivity, raring them and harvesting the milk, meat and hides that they needed was an easier option. That marked the beginning of animal domestication, resulting in some animal species, such as dogs, cats and ornamental fish breeds, to become fully domesticated species by the present times. A major step in this process involved identifying animals who were passive enough to be approached, caught, and held captive and tamed. This has resulted in the evolution of most domestic animal species to have traits that would make them better suited to a domestic setting while wiping out the traits which would help them survive in the wild. For example, evolution has taken away from the dogs, the traits of aggression shown by their distant relatives, the wolves, as well as any skills of surviving in the wild by hunting and avoiding predation. Therefore, if an enthusiast of animal rights is to argue that holding a gold fish in a fish tank is a violation of its rights and that it would be better off swimming freely in a stream, it is going to be one of the most frivolous points to make because a gold fish would hardly survive in a wild stream for more than 24 hours without getting predated. That is because the ancestors of these domestic animals, running back to hundreds of generations, have not even seen a wild environment so that their genes no longer contain the traits suited for the wild.

However, we cannot say the same about Asian elephants so confidently, because elephants still do exist in the wild and therefore is not a completely domesticated animal species. While the harsher environment that African elephants inhabit has made them more aggressive and violent by their genetic makeup, Asian elephants are more approachable which has enabled many countries to domesticate Asian elephants for centuries. Therefore, a fair number of domestic Asian elephants, found in many countries, are elephants who had been born and bred in domestic settings for generations. Hence, although many activists for animals rights have been voicing out in social media platforms that Nadungamuwe Raja lived a life of suffering by being chained in a domestic setting, having been an elephant born in a domestic elephant stable in India, it is uncertain what percentage of Nadungamuwe’s Raja’s genes still retained the traits that would help him survive in the wild. Usually, several generations of inbreeding of domesticated animals result in establishment of gene combinations best suited for domestic settings and purging those suited for wild environments. Still, it is uncertain how rapidly it happens in each species. With evolutionary biologists and behavioural scientists worldwide conducting a plethora of research on the question of whether nature or nurture determines the behavioural traits of an animal, the question of whether Nadungamuwe Raja would have been happier roaming freely in the wild remains an open question, with not enough data on how much of wild traits that he retained in his genes.

Nevertheless, if we were to assume that Nadungamuwe Raja was still biologically fully capable of living in a wild environment, we should not forget that he would be living in an environment where the humans have become a major predator for elephants. Evolution being a very slow process that takes millions of years, usually the genetic makeup that currently exists in many organisms is the genetic combination that evolved to suit the environmental conditions that existed thousands of years ago. The genome of many organisms is still undergoing the process of adapting to the current environment, which has changed rapidly from what it was a few hundreds of years back. Therefore, organisms do not evolve adaptations to match the changing environmental conditions as rapidly as the environment changes. The same is true for elephants because their genetic makeup has not evolved to keep up with the rapidly changing environment and hence, lack the adaptations to survive the threats posed by their greatest predator of the current world, the human. Therefore, it is fairly agreeable if someone says that Nadungamuwe Raja could have been poached long ago for his magnificent pair of tusks or could have been killed by ‘hakka patas’ traps if it had not lived in the seclusion of a domestic environment. However, it should be noted that Nadungamuwe Raja lived the average lifespan of an Asian elephant. The most common natural cause of death for wild elephants is a mechanical cause resulting from the loss of teeth. Elephants usually have four sets of teeth during their course of life and once the last set of teeth is lost, elephants die a slow and painful death due to the inability to feed and nourish themselves. It is noteworthy that the owners of Nadungamuwe Raja took the utmost effort to preserve the last set of teeth of the elephant so that his lifespan could be prolonged, by meticulously managing the elephant’s diet and behaviour. However, whether living in a natural environment and choosing his own diet from natural sources could have prolonged the lifespan of the elephant is contentious.

The increasing rarity of tusks as sumptuous as Nadungamuwe Raja’s in Asian elephants itself signals an evolutionary trend of elephants towards adaptation to the hostility created in wild environments by humans. It is the general trend of evolution to get rid of any traits that would pose a threat to the survival and fitness of any organism. By evolution, tusks serve the purpose of attracting female mates to male elephants, while helping males with combat with other males for territory and mates as well as obtaining food. With humans as a predator of elephants in wild environments, tusks have unfortunately become the worst nightmare for the survival of elephants in the wild. It is highly probable that the tusks of Nadungamuwe Raja could have brought the same unfortunate fate on him if he had lived in the wild. Even with living a domesticated life, the tusks of Nadungamuwe Raja had been too heavy for his head to bear towards the latter part of his life, although the situation had been ameliorated by his owners by arranging a sleeping place for the elephant where he could rest his head above his body. However, it is doubtful whether the tusks of Nadungamuwe Raja would have grown to that length and weight if it had lived in the wild. If a wild elephant had tusks as long and big as that, it goes without saying that it would pose a hinderance and a danger to the movement of the animal in dense vegetation, which are the common habitats of Asian elephants. Therefore, wild elephants have the habit of wearing off their tusks by rubbing them against tree branches, while the tusks of wild elephants are subjected to breakage during combats between males. For example, Gemunu, who is a well-known tusker inhabiting the Yala National Park of Sri Lanka, had only one tusk until recently, with the other being broken off during a dual. The remaining tusk was also broken off a couple of years earlier, during a dual with Nandimitra, another male elephant of the Yala National Park. Usually, once a male elephant loses his tusks in a combat, it either dies of the wounds of the combat or lives a quiet and short life restricted of mates or food of the territory, without the advantage of tusks. Therefore, another open question remains of whether Nadungamuwe Raja would have had such a luxurious pair of tusks until the end of his lifetime, had he lived in a wild environment.

Considering all these whether Nadungamuwe Raja was a prisoner of culture or not remains a question to be answered based on each person’s own morals and judgment. But, while dividing into sides and splitting hairs to prove whether Nadungamuwe Raja lived a life of a prisoner or that of royalty, there is a fact that many forget. While limiting the discussions about Nadungamuwe Raja to decorating him as an icon of Sri Lankan culture or fighting for his rights for a free life, we forget that not only Nadungamuwe Raja but all other domestic elephants of Sri Lanka which are treated with high esteem can serve a bigger role as ambassadors of environmental conservation. Nadungamuwe Raja and all other celebrated domestic elephants of Sri Lanka such as Kataragama Wasana, Indi Raja, Miyan Raja etc. fit perfectly well to the category of Flagship Species. The concept of Flagship Species introduced by the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) includes organisms having an aesthetic importance while representing a certain habitat, issue, or environmental cause. The objective of this concept is by conserving and drawing public attention to these animals which are of aesthetic attraction, the entire habitat they represent will be conserved and the environmental issue that they are involved in would be resolved. The giant panda endemic to China is an ideal example of a flagship species being a successful ambassador in resolving a conservation issue. With the giant panda being categorized as an endangered species by the IUCN in the 1980s, a massive campaign was launched to save China’s beloved national icon. This involved not only in-situ conservation efforts such as setting up nature reserve areas habitable for pandas, but also numerous ex-situ conservation techniques such as breeding pandas in captivity and propagating public interest and awareness on these cute creatures with the use of domesticated pandas held in captivity. These pandas did their job as environmental ambassadors so perfectly that by 2016, IUCN declared that giant pandas are no longer endangered but just vulnerable.

Right now, the number of Sri Lankans who worship Nadungamuwe Raja, holding him at a highly revered position is countless. Similarly, the number of Sri Lankans who fight for animal rights pointing out that Nadungamuwe Raja spent a torturous, miserable life is also fairly high. Amidst all that clamour, the number of elephants killed each year by poachers or by ‘hakka patas’ traps, the number of elephants shot by villagers for encroaching into cultivated lands, the number elephants hit by trains, plus the number of human lives lost each year by wild elephant attacks remain escalating. This disturbing trend signals to us that right now the most serious issue regarding elephants in Sri Lanka is not the debate of whether domestic elephants are cultural icons or prisoners of culture, but the human-elephant conflict which has gone unresolved, yet escalating to an extremely unfortunate level, for the past years. Wild elephants cannot be blamed for the circumstances considering the plight they are in with the construction of motorways fragmenting natural habitats of elephants and blocking their passes, human encroachment into natural habitats limiting the availability of food, water and space for the elephants plus poaching for ivory. On the other hand, the retaliation by humans to wild elephants is also fair considering the threat to property and lives it poses and the economic and emotional turmoil it costs when living in an area of wild elephant threat. That is why Nadungamuwe Raja and his fellow domestic elephants, should be viewed as ambassadors of environmental conservation rather than either icons or prisoners of culture. While thousands of people have been coming to pay their last respects to Nadungamuwe Raja with heavy hearts, while the authorities are taking steps to preserve Nadungamuwe Raja as a national treasure, while Nadungamuwe Raja’s predecessor tusker Raja has a museum dedicated all to himself and preserved and displayed as a national treasure, and while animal rights activists are launching heated social media campaigns to free the domestic elephants from their chains, there are numerous elephants in the island who portray major conservation issues. The wild elephant Natta Kota who roams the premises of tourist hotels bordering the Yala national park, has become a scavenger on garbage of the hotels which lure him to be a tourist attraction. The elephants inhabiting the forests bordering motorways of areas such as Habarana and Buttala had fallen to the plight of mafia gangsters who don’t let vehicles pass unless they are given the ransom of food. The elephants scavenging on garbage dumps of Tissamaharama have fallen to the plight of homeless beggars, picking through trash to fill their stomachs.

It goes without saying that Nadungamuwe Raja is a national treasure because a tusker of that stature and physique is indeed an asset to any country’s natural resource chest. But the reverence shown towards this animal needs to be extended to countless other elephants in Sri Lanka who are at the risk of getting poached for ivory, or killed by traps. As good as it is that Nadungamuwe Raja’s body be preserved as a national treasure as that of Raja, by housing it in a museum as a mere icon of cultural importance, the natural homes of the wild elephants of Sri Lanka needs to be preserved as well, as elephants are assets of Sri Lanka. The activists and enthusiasts of animal rights who voice out protests on the chained life that Nadungamuwe Raja led, should extend their fighting towards winning freedom for the numerous unnamed wild elephants who cannot roam wherever they wish in their native habitats and eat as much natural food as they like. Therefore, it is high time that the authorities start hailing Nandungamuwe Raja as an icon of conservational importance, rather than as a mere national treasure of cultural importance while the worshippers of Nandungamuwe Raja and the fighters for Nandungamuwe Raja’s animal rights start portraying him as an ambassador of environmental conservation rather than an ambassador of culture or a prisoner of culture.

(The writer is a PhD Student in Evolutionary Biology, University of Florida, Gainesville, US. She thanks Gihan Athapaththu, former Naturalist at Jetwing Yala, currently Master’s student at Jeju National University, South Korea, for his contribution to this article.)

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Features

The Venezuela Model:The new ugly and dangerous world order

Published

11 hours ago

2026/01/9

Thilina Walpola

The US armed forces invading Venezuela, removing its President Nicolás Maduro from power and abducting him and his wife Cilia Flores on 3 January 2026, flying them to New York and producing Maduro in a New York kangaroo court is now stale news, but a fact. What is a far more potent fact is the pan-global impotent response to this aggression except in Latin America, China, Russia and a few others.

Colombian President Gustavo Petro described the attack as an “assault on the sovereignty” of Latin America, thereby portraying the aggression as an assault on the whole of Latin America. Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva referred to the attack as crossing “an unacceptable line” that set an “extremely dangerous precedent.” Again, one can see his concern goes beyond Venezuela. For Mexican President Claudia Sheinbaum the attack was in “clear violation” of the UN Charter, which again is a fact. But when it comes to powerful countries, the UN Charter has been increasingly rendered irrelevant over decades, and by extension, the UN itself. For the French Foreign Minister, the operation went against the “principle of non-use of force that underpins international law” and that lasting political solutions cannot be “imposed by the outside.” UN Secretary General António Guterres said he was “deeply alarmed” about the “dangerous precedent” the United States has set where rules of international law were not being respected. Russia, notwithstanding its bloody and costly entanglement in Ukraine, and China have also issued strong statements.

Comparatively however, many other countries, many of whom are long term US allies who have been vocal against the Russian aggression in Ukraine have been far more sedate in their reaction. Compared to his Foreign Minister, French President Emmanuel Macron said the Venezuelan people could “only rejoice” at the ousting of Maduro while the German Chancellor Friedrich Merz believed Maduro had “led his country into ruin” and that the U.S. intervention required “careful consideration.” The British and EU statements have been equally lukewarm. India’s and Sri Lanka’s statements do not even mention the US while Sri Lanka’s main coalition partner the JVP has issued a strongly worded statement.

Taken together, what is lacking in most of these views, barring a negligible few, especially from the so-called powerful countries, is the moral indignation or outrage on a broad scale that used to be the case in similar circumstances earlier. It appears that a new ugly and dangerous world order has finally arrived, footprints of which have been visible for some time.

It is not that the US has not invaded sovereign countries and affected regime change or facilitated such change for political or economic reasons earlier. This has been attempted in Cuba without success since the 1950s but with success in Chile in 1973 under the auspices of Augusto Pinochet that toppled the legitimate government of president Salvador Allende and established a long-lasting dictatorship friendly towards the US; the invasion of Panama and the ouster and capture of President Manuel Noriega in 1989 and the 2003 invasion of Iraq both of which were conducted under the presidency of George Bush.

These are merely a handful of cross border criminal activities against other countries focused on regime change that the US has been involved in since its establishment which also includes the ouster of President of Guyana Cheddi Jagan in 1964, the US invasion of the Dominican Republic in 1965 stop the return of President Juan Bosch to prevent a ‘communist resurgence’; the 1983 US invasion of Grenada after the overthrow and killing of Prime Minister Maurice Bishop purportedly to ensure that the island would not become a ‘Soviet-Cuban’ colony. A more recent adventure was the 2004 removal and kidnapping of the Haitian President Jean-Bertrand Aristide, which also had French support.

There is however a difference between all the earlier examples of US aggression and the Venezuelan operation. The earlier operations where the real reasons may have varied from political considerations based on ideological divergence to crude economics, were all couched in the rhetoric of democracy. That is, they were undertaken in the guise of ushering democratic changes in those countries, the region or the world irrespective of the long-term death and destruction which followed in some locations. But in Venezuela under President Donald Trump, it is all about controlling natural resources in that country to satisfy US commercial interests.

The US President is already on record for saying the US will “run” Venezuela until a “safe transition” is concluded and US oil companies will “go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure, the oil infrastructure, and start making money” – ostensibly for the US and those in Venezuela who will tag the US line. Trump is also on record saying that the main aim of the operation was to regain U.S. oil rights, which according to him were “stolen” when Venezuela nationalized the industry. The nationalization was obviously to ensure that the funds from the industry remained in the country even though in later times this did lead to massive internal corruption.

Let’s be realistic. Whatever the noise of the new rhetoric is, this is not about ‘developing’ Venezuela for the benefit of its people based on some unknown streak of altruism but crudely controlling and exploiting its natural assets as was the case with Iraq. As crude as it is, one must appreciate Trump’s unintelligent honesty stemming from his own unmitigated megalomania. Whatever US government officials may say, the bottom line is the entire operation was planned and carried out purely for commercial and monetary gain while the pretext was Maduro being ‘a narco-terrorist.’ There is no question that Maduro was a dictator who was ruining his own country. But there is also no question that it is not the business of the US or any other country to decide what his or Venezuela’s fate is. That remains with the Venezuelan people.

What is dangerous is, the same ‘narco-terrorist’ rhetoric can also be applied to other Latin American countries such as Columbia, Brazil and Mexico which also produce some of the narcotics that come into the US consumer markets. The response should be not to invade these countries to stem the flow, but to deal with the market itself, which is the US. In real terms what Trump has achieved with his invasion of Venezuela for purely commercial gain and greed, followed by the abject silence or lukewarm reaction from most of the world, is to create a dangerous and ugly new normal for military actions across international borders. The veneer of democracy has also been dispensed with.

The danger lies in the fact that this new doctrine or model Trump has devised can similarly be applied to any country whose resources or land a powerful megalomaniac leader covets as long as he has unlimited access to military assets of his country, backed by the dubius remnants of the political and social safety networks, commonsense and ethics that have been conveniently dismantled. This is a description of the present-day United States too. This danger is boosted when the world remains silent. After the success of the Venezuela operation, Trump has already upended his continuing threats to annex Greenland because “we need Greenland from the standpoint of national security.” Greenland too is not about security, but commerce given its vast natural resources.

Hours after Venezuela, Trump threatened the Colombian President Gustavo Petro to “watch his ass.” In the present circumstances, Canadians also would not have forgotten Trump’s threat earlier in 2025 to annex Canada. But what the US President and his current bandwagon replete with arrogance and depleted intelligence would not understand is, beyond the short-term success of the Venezuela operation and its euphoria, the dangerous new normal they have ushered in would also create counter threats towards the US, the region and the world in a scale far greater than what exists today. The world will also become a far less safe place for ordinary American citizens.

More crucially, it will also complicate global relations. It would no longer be possible for the mute world leaders to condemn Russian action in Ukraine or if China were to invade Taiwan. The model has been created by Trump, and these leaders have endorsed it. My reading is that their silence is not merely political timidity, but strategic to their own national and self-interest, to see if the Trump model could be adopted in other situations in future if the fallout can be managed.

The model for the ugly new normal has been created and tested by Trump. Its deciding factors are greed and dismantled ethics. It is now up to other adventurers to fine tune it. We would be mere spectators and unwitting casualties.

Features

Beyond the beauty: Hidden risks at waterfalls

Published

12 hours ago

2026/01/9

Thilina Walpola

Bambarakanda waterfall. Image courtesy LANKA EXCURSIONS HOLIDAYS

Sri Lanka is blessed with a large number of scenic waterfalls, mainly concentrated in the central highlands. These natural features substantially enhance the country’s attractiveness to tourists. Further, these famous waterfalls equally attract thousands of local visitors throughout the year.

While waterfalls offer aesthetic appeal, a serene environment, and recreational opportunities, they also pose a range of significant hazards. Unfortunately, the visitors are often unable to identify these different types of risks, as site-specific safety information and proper warning signs are largely absent. In most locations, only general warnings are displayed, often limited to the number of past fatalities. This can lead visitors to assume that bathing is the sole hazard, which is not the case. Therefore, understanding the full range of waterfall-related risks and implementing appropriate safety measures is essential for preventing loss of life. This article highlights site-specific hazards to raise public awareness and prevent people from putting their lives at risk due to these hidden dangers.

Flash floods and resultant water surges

Flash floods are a significant hazard in hill-country waterfalls. According to the country’s topography, most of the streams originate from the catchments in the hilly areas upstream of the waterfalls. When these catchments receive intense rainfalls, the subsequent runoff will flow down as flash floods. This will lead to an unexpected rise in the flow of the waterfall, increasing the risk of drowning and even sweeping away people. Therefore, bathing at such locations is extremely dangerous, and those who are even at the river banks have to be vigilant and should stay away from the stream as much as possible. The Bopath Ella, Ravana Ella, and a few waterfalls located in the Belihul Oya area, closer to the A99 road, are classic examples of this scenario.

Water currents

The behaviour of water in the natural pool associated with the waterfall is complex and unpredictable. Although the water surface may appear calm, strong subsurface currents and hydraulic forces exist that even a skilled swimmer cannot overcome. Hence, a person who immerses confidently may get trapped inside and disappear. Water from a high fall accelerates rapidly, forming hydraulic jumps and vortices that can trap swimmers or cause panic. Hence, bathing in these natural pools should be totally avoided unless there is clear evidence that they are safe.

Slipping risks

Slipping is a common hazard around waterfalls. Sudden loss of footing can lead to serious injuries or fatal falls into deep pools or rock surfaces. The area around many waterfalls consists of steep, slippery rocks due to moisture and the growth of algae. Sometimes, people are overconfident and try to climb these rocks for the thrill of it and to get a better view of the area. Further, due to the presence of submerged rocks, water depths vary in the natural pool area, and there is a chance of sliding down along slippery rocks into deep water. Waterfalls such as Diyaluma, Bambarakanda, and Ravana Falls are likely locations for such hazards, and caution around these sites is a must.

Rockfalls

Rockfalls are a significant hazard around waterfalls in steep terrains. Falling rocks can cause serious injuries or fatalities, and smaller stones may also be carried by fast-flowing water. People bathing directly beneath waterfalls, especially smaller ones, are therefore exposed to a high risk of injury. Accordingly, regardless of the height of the waterfall, bathing under the falling water should be avoided.

Hypothermia and cold shock

Hypothermia is a drop in body temperature below 35°C due to cold exposure. This leads to mental confusion, slowed heartbeat, muscle stiffening, and even cardiac arrest may follow. Waterfalls in Nuwara Eliya district often have very low water temperatures. Hence, immersing oneself in these waters is dangerous, particularly for an extended period.

Human negligence

Additional hazards also arise from visitors’ own negligence. Overcrowding at popular waterfalls significantly increases the risk of accidents, including slips and falls from cliffs. Sometimes, visitors like to take adventurous photographs in dangerous positions. Reckless behavior, such as climbing over barriers, ignoring warning signs, or swimming in prohibited zones, amplifies the risk.

Mitigation and safety

measures

Mitigation of waterfall-related hazards requires a combination of public awareness, engineering solutions, and policy enforcement. Clear warning signs that indicate the specific hazards associated with the water fall, rather than general hazard warnings, must be fixed. Educating visitors verbally and distributing bills that include necessary guidelines at ticket counters, where applicable, will be worth considering. Furthermore, certain restrictions should vary depending on the circumstances, especially seasonal variation of water flow, existing weather, etc.

Physical barriers should be installed to prevent access to dangerous areas by fencing. A viewing platform can protect people from many hazards discussed above. For bathing purposes, safer zones can be demarcated with access facilities.

Installing an early warning system for heavily crowded waterfalls like Bopath Ella, which is prone to flash floods, is worth implementing. Through a proper mechanism, a warning system can alert visitors when the upstream area receives rainfall that may lead to flash floods in the stream.

At present, there are hardly any officials to monitor activities around waterfalls. The local authorities that issue tickets and collect revenue have to deploy field officers to these waterfalls sites for monitoring the activities of visitors. This will help reduce not only accidents but also activities that cause environmental pollution and damage. We must ensure that these natural treasures remain a source of wonder rather than danger.

(The writer is a chartered Civil Engineer specialising in water resources engineering)

By Eng. Thushara Dissanayake ✍️

Features

From sacred symbol to silent victim: Sri Lanka’s elephants in crisis

Published

12 hours ago

2026/01/9

Thilina Walpola

The year 2025 began with grim news. On 1st January, a baby elephant was struck and killed by a train in Habarana, marking the start of a tragic series of elephant–train collisions that continued throughout the year. In addition to these incidents, the nation mourned the deaths of well-known elephants such as Bathiya and Kandalame Hedakaraya, among many others. As the year drew on, further distressing reports emerged, including the case of an injured elephant that was burnt with fire, an act of extreme cruelty that ultimately led to its death. By the end of the year, Sri Lanka recorded the highest number of elephant deaths in Asia.

This sorrowful reality stands in stark contrast to Sri Lanka’s ancient spiritual heritage. Around 250 BCE, at Mihintale, Arahant Mahinda delivered the Cūḷahatthipadopama Sutta (The Shorter Discourse on the Simile of the Elephant’s Footprint) to King Devanampiyatissa, marking the official introduction of Buddhism to the island. The elephant, a symbol deeply woven into this historic moment, was once associated with wisdom, restraint, and reverence.

Yet the recent association between Mihintale and elephants has been anything but noble. At Mihintale an elephant known as Ambabo, already suffering from a serious injury to his front limb due to human–elephant conflict (HEC), endured further cruelty when certain local individuals attempted to chase him away using flaming torches, burning him with fire. Despite the efforts of wildlife veterinary surgeons, Ambabo eventually succumbed to his injuries. The post-mortem report confirmed severe liver and kidney impairment, along with extensive trauma caused by the burns.

Was prevention possible?

The question that now arises is whether this tragedy could have been prevented.

To answer this, we must examine what went wrong.

When Ambabo first sustained an injury to his forelimb, he did receive veterinary treatment. However, after this initial care, no close or continuous monitoring was carried out. This lack of follow-up is extremely dangerous, especially when an injured elephant remains near human settlements. In such situations, some individuals may attempt to chase, harass, or further harm the animal, without regard for its condition.

A similar sequence of events occurred in the case of Bathiya. He was initially wounded by a trap gun—devices generally intended for poaching bush meat rather than targeting elephants. Following veterinary treatment, his condition showed signs of improvement. Tragically, while he was still recovering, he was shot a second time behind the ear. This second wound likely damaged vital nerves, including the vestibular nerve, which plays a critical role in balance, coordination of movement, gaze stabilisation, spatial orientation, navigation, and trunk control. In effect, the second shooting proved far more devastating than the first.

After Bathiya received his initial treatment, he was left without proper protection due to the absence of assigned wildlife rangers. This critical gap in supervision created the opportunity for the second attack. Only during the final stages of his suffering were the 15th Sri Lanka Artillery Regiment, the 9th Battalion of the Sri Lanka National Guard, and the local police deployed—an intervention that should have taken place much earlier.

Likewise, had Ambabo been properly monitored and protected after his injury, it is highly likely that his condition would not have deteriorated to such a tragic extent.

It should also be mentioned that when an injured animal like an elephant is injured, the animal will undergo a condition that is known as ‘capture myopathy’. It is a severe and often fatal condition that affects wild animals, particularly large mammals such as elephants, deer, antelope, and other ungulates. It is a stress-induced disease that occurs when an animal experiences extreme physical exertion, fear, or prolonged struggle during capture, restraint, transport, or pursuit by humans. The condition develops when intense stress causes a surge of stress hormones, leading to rapid muscle breakdown. This process releases large amounts of muscle proteins and toxins into the bloodstream, overwhelming vital organs such as the kidneys, heart, and liver. As a result, the animal may suffer from muscle degeneration, dehydration, metabolic acidosis, and organ failure. Clinical signs of capture myopathy include muscle stiffness, weakness, trembling, incoordination, abnormal posture, collapse, difficulty breathing, dark-coloured urine, and, in severe cases, sudden death. In elephants, the condition can also cause impaired trunk control, loss of balance, and an inability to stand for prolonged periods. Capture myopathy can appear within hours of a stressful event or may develop gradually over several days. So, if the sick animal is harassed like it happened to Ambabo, it does only make things worse. Unfortunately, once advanced symptoms appear, treatment is extremely difficult and survival rates are low, making prevention the most effective strategy.

What needs to be done?

Ambabo’s harassment was not an isolated incident; at times injured elephants have been subjected to similar treatment by local communities. When an injured elephant remains close to human settlements, it is essential that wildlife officers conduct regular and continuous monitoring. In fact, it should be made mandatory to closely observe elephants in critical condition for a period even after treatment has been administered—particularly when they remain in proximity to villages. This approach is comparable to admitting a critically ill patient to a hospital until recovery is assured.

At present, such sustained monitoring is difficult due to the severe shortage of staff in the Department of Wildlife Conservation. Addressing this requires urgent recruitment and capacity-building initiatives, although these solutions cannot be realised overnight. In the interim, it is vital to enlist the support of the country’s security forces. Their involvement is not merely supportive—it is essential for protecting both wildlife and people.

To mitigate HEC, a Presidential Committee comprising wildlife specialists developed a National Action Plan in 2020. The strategies outlined in this plan were selected for their proven effectiveness, adaptability across different regions and timeframes, and cost-efficiency. The process was inclusive, incorporating extensive consultations with the public and relevant authorities. If this Action Plan is fully implemented, it holds strong potential to significantly reduce HEC and prevent tragedies like the suffering endured by Ambabo. In return it will also benefit villagers living in those areas.

In conclusion, I would like to share the wise words of Arahant Mahinda to the king, which, by the way, apply to every human being:

O’ great king, the beasts that roam the forest and birds that fly the skies have the same right to this land as you. The land belongs to the people and to all other living things, and you are not its owner but only its guardian.

by Tharindu Muthukumarana ✍️
tharinduele@gmail.com
(Author of the award-winning book “The Life of Last Proboscideans: Elephants”)