Even as the world over Valentine’s week is being celebrated with couples sharing love, the 41 female captive elephants that are with the Hindu Religious and Charitable Endowment Board (HR&CE) are forever living the life of spinsters.

Policy level decisions and practical difficulties have been a long time hindrance for these elephants, who – despite living a life in chains and only given a respite of 30 days in natural habitat – are never given any opportunity to find love with the opposite sex.

The elephants, which are domesticated social animals, live a lonely life in the temples except for the union with other female elephants during the elephant rejuvenation camp in Mettupalayam, with the stress of not having a mate during the oestrus cycle.

According to sources, female elephants come to heat periodically in four months and the cycle may continue for a few days. During this period, bulls in musth come in search of females in their cycle. But this is a scene in the wild; those in captivity only undergo stress during their cycles.

According to experts, mahouts use special strategies to reduce the duration of the cycle in both male and female elephants. “We usually reduce the food of the male elephants so that the hormone secretion is reduced and the bull undergoes a shorter musth period,” said a mahout.

In the case of female elephants in temples, a less cautious approach is made as females are not as aggressive as males during their cycles. “We give normal food during the cycle, but would reduce the work,” a mahout said.

Tamil Nadu Forest Department (TNFD) and HR & CE officials did give this a thought and various ideas were made to allow female elephants to mate with the Kumki elephants in the TNFD.

There are close to 33 male Kumkis with TNFD and they are let inside the forest to find wild females during the musth. The idea was initially to find a way to connect a bull in his musth, with a temple cow in her cycle.
However, according to a senior official with TNFD temple management would not allow such activities inside the temple as they claimed it was “impure”.

“Even travelling would be an added stress for both males and females in their cycle. The only way is to bring the females to the Kumki camps in Mudumalai and Anamalai. But many papers need to be signed and policy level changes should be made before this could become a reality,” said the official.

Reacting to this, a senior official with HR & CE said that it also took a lot of money for the whole process of travelling. “This is good for the elephants as they would feel more natural. But a calf would again increase the cost. A long thought process should be made before things could be decided,” the official told the Covai Post.