A
TRIBUTE TO RUMBHA - the elephant
When I mentioned two famous tigers of
Corbett national park earlier in these columns, I was
pleasantly surprised by some very evocative responses
from readers who recalled the good old days when these
tigers were the pride of Corbett. Heartened by these
responses, I am moved to recount the story of the
famous Corbett elephant Rumbha and her mahout
Ishtiaq,
which was published soon after she died.....
The tiger had moved deep into the
elephant grass, and it now seemed difficult to
dislodge him from there. Although we could still see
him indistinctly, a deep nullah prevented us from
going any nearer for that vital photograph that I
still hadn't been able to get. It was here that the
intricate combination of mahout and elephant revealed
itself. Ishtiaq, the mahout, motioned to me to
stay ready with my camera, while his toes sent silent
directives to Rumbha, the elephant. In response, the
snaking trunk lifted a huge clod of wet mud and sent
it flying across the dividing nullah, landing in a
spray on the recalcitrant tiger. Alarmed, or probably
angry at this ignominy, out he came roaring in a mock
charge, canines fully bared. For those few moments the
humans clearly perceived the terror that strikes a
tiger's prey. It may have lasted seconds, but was
enough to freeze our blood. Thankfully, the fingers
worked away in reflex to give our cameras the
everlasting impressions of a charging tiger. "Wah
wah Ishtiaq, wah Rumbha wah, shabaash!"
went the rounds of congratulations and thanksgiving,
showered excitedly on the mahout and his charge,
following this magnificent sighting of the elusive
tiger.
Ishtiaq
and Rumbha, Rumbha and Ishtiaq. A combination in which
there were no peers. For all serious visitors to the
famous Corbett National Park, a ride into the forests
with Ishtiaq is a unique experience. An excellent
tracker, he deftly reads the signs left by the
denizens of the forest from atop his lofty perch on
Rumbha's neck. And if during the ride, the situation
does not warrant absolute silence, in his own
inimitable style and dialect, he will give you a
lesson or two in jungle lore that you are not likely
to find in any book. Being the most sought after pair
in Corbett, he and his elephant have perforce taken
many a pompous VIP into the forest, but for the
average wildlife enthusiast, Ishtiaq is the VIP,
easily striking a balance of camaraderie and
strictness with the tourists while out on his two
excursions each day.
I
have had the privilege of being a close friend of
Ishtiaq ever since my visits to Corbett started in
1985. Initially going out with any mahout that
happened to be allotted to me, I gradually learnt to
distinguish between the good ones and the average.
This process of elimination finally resulted in
short-listing a couple of mahouts like Nazir and Nawab.
And of course, Ishtiaq. The top slot, however, went
easily to Ishtiaq because of his elephant, Rumbha. She
was sure-footed and steady on all kinds of terrain.
Right from the time one started off from camp astride
her, one felt brave and confident of facing the tiger
on its own ground. Never known to have backed off or
panicked, she easily conveyed her confidence to the
riders through her studied nonchalance during tiger
sightings. Even if there were no sightings of the big
cat, the ride itself was always eventful. And
so, year after year I returned to Corbett for the
inevitable rendezvous with my human and pachyderm
friend.
Recently
preoccupied by frequent visits to Bandhavgarh and
Kanha national parks, I had been unable to find time
to go to Corbett for almost two years. Blaming myself
for this lapse in loyalty for my most favourite
forest, I finally squeezed in a trip to Corbett during
end-January. The thrill of reaching Dhikala camp was
as exhilarating as ever. The welcoming hugs from the
modest staff members were so warm that they dispelled
the biting cold of the season. But tragic news was at
hand. "Rumbha is dying," they told me.
It was shocking and unbelievable. Elephants have long
lives, we've been told. How could she die, she was
only seventy. We made a beeline for the place where
Rumbha was lying sick and helpless. The very first
sight of the fallen giant made me falter. She was
lying on her left side. The ground where she lay had
been scraped and muddied by her vain efforts to stand
upright. A bonfire was burning nearby to ward off the
cold from her, as well as the humans attending on her.
There was Ishtiaq, his wife and children, the Range
Officer, and a motley group of other mahouts and
characuts. All had genuine concern on their faces. An
elephant for a mahout is not an animal but a family
member. And here, a family member was dying.
Ishtiaq
and I met each other without speaking. The signs were
all too evident to warrant speech. We walked up to
where her head lay, and sat down close to her. The
only eye visible on that gaunt face followed us. While
I stroked her feeble trunk, Ishtiaq reached out and
wiped the trickling discharge from under her eye.
" Na beta, mat ro. Bahut dard ho raha hai?"
he asked. I also felt the start of a trickle on my
face that needed wiping, and I did that furtively.
Later,
sitting on a charpoy near the blazing fire where
Rumbha lay, I finally managed to piece together the
events that were about to deprive Corbett National
Park of one of its most well known treasures.
Soon
after Corbett Park closed for the monsoons last year,
a wild tusker started making frequent forays into the
Dhikala encampment. Probably emboldened by the lack of
tourist activity, or maybe spurred on by the enticing
smell of the female riding elephants in the camp, he
repeatedly targeted the filkhana or stables where the
elephants were quartered. More often than not, he was
driven off before he could actually enter, but on 16th
July, he managed to sneak in, and in the ensuing
melee, drove a tusk into Rumbha's right ear. The wound
was not severe, but took time to heal. During
treatment, she was quartered at Ramnagar from where
she returned to Dhikala in November, in time for the
start of another busy tourist season. But not being
certified fully fit by the vet, she remained off duty.
It
was on the fateful night of 24th November that the
wild tusker raided the filkhana again. Probably out of
panic because of her last encounter with him, she
jerked frantically at the hobble-chain restraining her
hind leg, breaking it with sheer effort. The commotion
culminated with the Range Officer firing in the air
and scaring off the tusker. But in the effort of
breaking the chain, something in Rumbha's leg snapped
too. According to Ishtiaq, it was not a broken bone,
nor even a dislocation. It was some vital nerve that
suffered a traumatic injury, resulting in the leg
getting inflamed and bloated out of all proportion.
Getting
to work with his indigenous and native remedies,
Ishtiaq treated and nursed her leg for almost one
month. Rumbha showed signs of recovery, the
inflammation on her leg subsided, but she didn't
attain full fitness. She was checked up on 21st
January by doctors from Pantnagar, who prescribed
tonics and calcium tablets to speed up her recovery.
But that probably was not ordained. She stopped eating
her rations from the next day, despite all efforts
from her human friends to coerce or force-feed her.
Six days of starvation for an ailing elephant took
their toll, and on 27th morning, she fell down heavily
on her face. That, according to Ishtiaq, was an
ominous sign. All her desperate efforts to get up,
even with the support of the puny human hands, sapped
whatever little energy that may have been left in her
emaciated frame. Nayyar, a forest department staffer,
gave her two bottles of intravenous glucose, but it
was already too late. By the time I arrived at Dhikala
at noon, all hopes had been lost, and when I sat down
near her with Ishtiaq, we were just two of a group of
helpless onlookers, desolately awaiting the passing of
a forest giant.
While
we sat near her late into the night, Rumbha's death
throes continued. She kept writhing and stretching her
legs again and again. Each movement resulted in a
discharge of urine, indicating that her sphincter
muscles had succumbed to the weakness. But not once
did she utter a sound. When Irfan, her characut pushed
in a lump of gur into her mouth, she weakly but firmly
twirled her trunk around his arm and clearly told him
not to do that. And so, all that her human retinue
could do was to stoke the fire to keep it burning
warmly, and to keep adjusting the huge cotton gadda
that was her protection from the night dew, and which
repeatedly kept falling off her jerky, twitching body.
Before
retiring for the night, I stroked her gently for the
last time, and promised myself that I would not come
near her again, and thus avoid seeing her in mortal
agony. The thrill of coming to Corbett had transformed
into sadness, and even the sighting of a magnificent
male tiger that crossed from under the Dhikala
watchtower,
had failed to dissipate the gloom. Next morning, I was
told that she spent the night in great discomfort, and
that the road gang labourers had now been
requisitioned to start digging the pit that would be
her grave. Not feeling brave enough to face the end, I
came away from Dhikala, foolishly confident that I had
left her alive, and hoping that she just might survive
after all.
Since
then I have had one thing uppermost on my mind. I
wanted everyone who knew and loved Rumbha to know
about her passing, but the hope for the miracle to
happen kept alive. The dreaded news however arrived on
4th February when Suresh Pant, a Dhikala staff member,
came to visit me.
Rumbha
died at 8.45 PM on 28th of January 1998. Her gaunt
body now rests within the Dhikala camp, at the very
spot where she had fallen down to breathe her last.
Ishtiaq's companion of fourteen years, and the
favourite of countless Indian and foreign wildlife
enthusiasts, has finally passed on to the Happy
Hunting Grounds.