By Shaligram Nepal

Chitwan, June 18: Private elephant operating organisations of Sauraha have sought permission to graze their animals near the Chitwan National Park (CNP) forest.
United Elephants Cooperative, the governing body of private elephant operators, held a press conference in Sauraha, Chitwan on Wednesday and asked for permission to graze their tuskers near the park forest, saying that they had no money to feed them.
Cooperative President Rishi Ram Tiwari said that the lockdown and lack of tourists had effectively blocked their income, making it difficult to care for their elephants.
There are 70 private elephants in Sauraha under the cooperative. “There are no tourists. Hotels are closed. And we have not been able to buy the hay and grains to feed our elephants,” he said.
The hotels used to hire the cooperative’s elephants to take their guests on a safari around the buffer zone of the national park.
The hotels have been closed since the lockdown began and so, the operators have lost their earnings.
“We should be allowed to take our elephants to the banks of the Rapti River and near the national park,” demanded Tiwari. According to President Tiwari, it costs between Rs 70,000 to Rs 100,000 per month to keep an elephant. “One elephant requires two carers, two tractors of hay, 250 litres of water and 20 kilograms of rice a day, salt, grams and other things,” he said.
The operators had been allowed to graze their elephants near the park for the first two months of the lockdown but this permission has now been revoked.
Chief Conservation Officer of CNP Narayan Rupakheti made it clear that private elephants could not always be allowed in the park area. “The elephants had been allowed to graze near the Rapti river for the first two months for humanitarian reasons. But we can’t continue that now,” he informed. Rupakheti expressed that elephants kept for business purposes should be cared for by the operators at their own cost. “The rules have to be changed if we are to graze them inside the park,” he said.
Tiwari, however, opined that the park should take care of private elephants in this time of need because the operators have been paying an annual sum of Rs 10 million as revenue for taking their elephants into the buffer zone.
President of Regional Hotel Association Sauraha Deepak Bhattarai worried that tourism in ​​Chitwan would be destroyed if the elephants were not saved. “Tourists will not come here if they can’t see and ride elephants. So, the state should step in to care for them during this time of crisis,” he expressed.