THRISSUR: Acting on a complaint of Heritage Animal Task Force, a pro-animal group and news reports, the forest department has registered cases against five persons over an alleged incident of using fire sparklers atop a hired elephant during a church festival at Pazhanji on October 3. The review monitoring committee meeting on captive elephants on Monday at the collectorate discussed the issue at length after Animal Welfare Board representative M. N. Jayachandran raised it. It is now before the district collector A. Kowsigan.
“Even though the forest department did not pay much attention to the incident, I brought it to the committee and collector, who is its chairman and he sought an explanation from the assistant conservator of forest (social forestry) Jaya Madhavan,” Mr Jayachandran said. Mr Madhavan later said the forest officials booked five after an inquiry.
During the two-day fest at the St Mary's Orthodox Cathedral, the complaint said, fire sparklers were fixed to handles and erected atop the elephant. The fire sparked went up four metres high atop the elephant as seen in the video footage.
Task Force secretary Venkitachalam said it was a flagrant violation of the latest High Court order laying down the safety guidelines including 100-metre distance for festival fireworks.
