Forest department cancels traditional pooja to elephants

Mysuru: The forest department has cancelled the traditional pooja to elephants on Wednesday following demise of forest minister Umesh Katti. DCF Karikalan has informed that the traditional puja has been cancelled today for the second team of elephants which entered palace .

He said the first team of elephants including Arjuna, Gopalaswamy, Dhananjaya, Mahendra, Bhima, Kaveri, Chaitra and Lakshi elephants, led by Abhimanyu, had already arrived on August 7 at Mysuru and entered palace on August 10 from Jayamarthanda gate. The elephants were given traditional reception with pooja and started training .

The second batch of five elephants of which the 18-year-old youngest elephant, Parthasarathy, has arrived from the Rampur camp , the rest of the elephants include , Sri Rama and Sugriva, Gopi and Vijaya, who came from Dubare elephant camp. DCF Karikalan said that the total of 14 elephants includes first batch of 9 elephants will be given training on canon firing from tomorrow and all the preparations were made in this regard. He said all the elephants will be weighed as usual.