Training for Dasara elephant Abhimanyu to carry wooden howdah begins

Four to five additional Elephants will also be trained to carry wooden howdah, as part of backup plan

Mysuru: After successful completion of training for seven Dasara Elephants to carry 500kg weight, training to carry wooden howdah with weight equivalent to golden howdah began for Dasara Elephants on Wednesday evening at 5.50pm.

Even as Abhimanyu stood between two rows of over 3 meter tall metal stands, near the residential area of Mysuru Palace (on left side of Palace), special team comprising Akram, Rehan, Murthy and others lifted the wooden howdah by tying rope to it by using a special crane.

They placed the wooden howdah over the cushion of Namda (made of coconut fiber), Gaadi (made of hay straw) and Chaapu (made of coconut fiber, which is thinner and smaller in size to match the size of wooden howdah) on Abhimanyu. They tied it gently to it using jute ropes. They placed sand bags inside wooden howdah ensuring the entire weight is equivalent to 750kg golden howdah.

After a small pooja, flanked by Lakshmi and Hiranya he marched on Dasara Jamboo Savari procession route or Raja marga from North gate of Mysuru Palace and passed through KR Circle, Sayyaji Rao road and reached Bannimantap ground. There, the wooden howdah with weight was removed. After relaxing for a while, Abhimanyu and team moved back to Palace premises.

Dhananjaya, Gopi, Bheema, Rohith, Kanjan, Ekalavya, Sugreeva, Mahendra, Prashantha and Doddaharave Lakshmi joined him for the session. Varalakshmi who is aged, is resting.

Along with forest officials DCF Prabhugowda and RFO Santhosh Hoogar, Veterinarian Mujeeb Ur Rehman and other forest department personnel, accompanied them.

DCF (wild life) Mysuru division I B Prabhugowda said, "It has been finalised that Abhimanyu will carry golden howdah during Dasara Jamboo Savari procession on Vijayadashami day. But as part of the back up plan, in case of emergency they are now training four to five additional Elephants to carry wooden howdah," he said.

He added, "Prior to it, in order to prepare second line Elephants, they have trained additional Elephants Dhananjaya, Mahendra, Bheema, Gopi, Sugreeva and Ekalavya to carry 500 kg weight along with Abhimanyu," he said.

RFO Santhosh Hoogar said, "While earlier they just trained five Elephants to carry weight, this time they have trained seven of them to carry weight," he said.

Veterinarian in-charge of Dasara Elephants, Mujeeb Ur Rehman said that the health of all 14 Dasara Elephants is fine, he said.

After their arrival at Mysuru Palace premises on August 23, the training to familiarise the Dasara procession route for Dasara Elephants began on August 25. Training to carry weight began on September 1.

People continued to line up on either side of the road to have a glimpse of Abhimanyu carrying wooden howdah and marching along with his team. As usual Police and Traffic police escorted Elephants, guarded their security, cleared traffic during the training on the procession route.

Magnetic metal detector/scanner attached to the escort vehicle which moves ahead of Elephants on the procession route during training has been continuing to detect and attract atleast half a kg nails or any metals each day. This detector is used to ensure those metals don't prick the feet of Elephants, officials said.