by Mark Shand
‘Sri Ram Naik always collected the resin from which I make my own incense. I knew him well. He was a splendid man.’ As we were leaving, the Maharaja presented me with a plastic bag. I opened it. Inside were pieces of crystallised bark. ‘This is resin,’ he explained. ‘Sri Ram Naik’s last delivery.’
On the outskirts of Joshipur, we met up with two female elephants, the larger resembling an old and dusty tramp, dwarfing her little companion who hung on to her tail with her trunk. Both elephants were in poor condition – gaunt, almost skeletal. They stood listlessly, not bothering to brush away the flies that crawled over their eyes, from which dripped a white mucus. They greeted Tara placing their trunks into her mouth. Standing beside them she shone – a beautiful Maharani attended by two dowdy maidservants.
‘Haathi no good,’ Bhim said disdainfully. ‘Both no see.’
We stopped to talk with their mahouts, mendicants who were working their way south through Orissa. By November, they would return to Benares, where the elephants’ owner lived, a rich pandit who kept a stable of forty elephants. The elder man sported a curling, white moustache, his greedy eyes never leaving Tara. He offered to sell us the smaller elephant for 60,000 rupees. As if to show her off, he yanked down viciously on the ankush which hung from a rusty pin, piercing one of her ears. In resignation, she simply shook her head slowly. He then offered half this price for Tara. His contemptuous proposal was met with howls of derision from us, and we moved on laughing, ridiculing his impudence.
Then it hit me. My laughter died. A feeling of cold dread swept over me. I had been offered a price: however absurd, it was still a price and for the first time I became aware of Tara’s destiny. In that brief moment, the entire context of what I was doing changed. It was no longer the romantic ride on an elephant across India that I had dreamed up so flippantly – a whim to satisfy my ambitions. It was reality, however camouflaged by the colour and the beauty – it was there, hard and completely unchangeable. Tara was my responsibility, her future life lay in my hands and every step she took brought me nearer to that moment. I tried to force it into the back of my mind. But it was now there, hanging like a relentless black shadow.
12
Double Dipper
IN A MATTER of a mile, the difference between Orissa and Bihar became visible. It was like suddenly parting the leaves on the edge of a rain forest and stepping into a scorched desert. Gone was the colour, the lushness, the laughter, the languid sensuality that manifested itself in Orissa, to be replaced by a harsh, suspicious and angry terrain. It showed in the quality of the tea, the sudden absence of fresh paan, the drabness of the lunghis, the condition of the villages and, above all, in the people. Our attitude changed accordingly. Bhim and Gokul became nervous and unsure of themselves.
Soon after we entered Bihar an incident occurred that exemplified this new feeling. An aggressive, stocky man with a bald head that gleamed like a billiard ball in the sun approached us driving a large loaded cart pulled by two bullocks. In an attempt to prevent the inevitable chaos, I steered Tara off the road and faced her away from the bullocks to allow them to pass as I had done in Orissa. He shouted at me angrily to get my elephant out of the way. I had already done this, but to avoid an unpleasant scene I moved a little further, at least two hundred yards off the road. He drove his bullocks forward, whipping them with a bamboo pole, and he had just come abreast of us when they panicked. Snorting with fear the bullocks raced along the road for a few yards, flew over a ten-foot drop to land in a muddy paddy field the other side, snapped their harness and made off quickly. Unimpressed as I was with his character I could not help but feel admiration for his driving skill. From a position with bullocks, cart and driver in mid-air, he landed the contraption like a seasoned jet pilot.
Unfortunately he did not reciprocate with admiration for Tara and me. He came stomping up the bank, gathering a few villagers on the way. ‘This is my village and my road,’ he spluttered furiously. ‘Your elephant is a menace.’
‘Excuse me, sir,’ I interjected politely, ‘this may be your village, but a road is built for the purposes of travel. Anybody can travel on it, including an elephant which, I would like to point out, is not a menace. If you recall, I moved off the road to let you pass.’
‘Unless you give me compensation of five rupees I will impound your elephant,’ he shouted. If he had been more civil and not insulted Tara, I would have paid gladly.
‘How do you think you are going to impound my elephant?’ I demanded angrily, flicking her behind the ear. She rolled her head and moved towards him. His eyes filled with alarm as this large beast loomed in front of him. He did not reply and we moved on.
Fortunately this feeling did not seem to be constant. At Majhgaon, a predominantly Muslim village, we were entertained royally by the elders, splendid old men in dhotis with long white beards. Delighted to see Tara, they crowded around her placing coins in her trunk, and even crushed paper money. Under the impression that the bank notes might contain something to eat, Tara investigated carefully, before dropping them despondently. Clearly, when she had been with Rajpath she had not received such riches.
One of the elders, the village tailor, took me into his shop over which a sign proudly proclaimed IMAM TAILORS, MAJHGAON. PERFECT FITTING LADIES AND GENTS. GOD MAKE A MAN, WE MAKE GENTLEMAN.
‘If I may say so, sir,’ he said, ‘for an Englishman you are poorly dressed.’ Measuring my waistline, he presented me with a pair of violet bell-bottom trousers and a matching shirt. ‘Now,’ he said, eyeing me critically, ‘you look like a gentleman.’
Indrajit and Khusto managed to find a quiet campsite that night. To celebrate the halfway point of our journey we drank a great deal of rum. Unsteady and feeling inexplicably maudlin, I made my way over to where Tara was chained. I sat down in front of her and a feeling of great sadness swept over me. It was then that I knew I could not sell her. The two blind elephants and the sight of Tara when she had been with Rajpath, convinced me. I had to find her a good home. She would never be a beggar again. I drank more of the rum, wondering unrealistically if I could take her back to England. Not to some concrete zoo but to a wonderful estate where she could retire and live happily.
Many years ago the Duke of Devonshire had faced a similar situation. He had met a lady who enquired what she could bring back for him from her travels in India. He had replied jokingly, ‘Ah, nothing less than an elephant.’ To his astonishment, some months later, an elephant duly arrived. It was kept in a large enclosure in the grounds of his house in Chiswick, developing an undying passion for the gardener, who put the animal to work. The elephant brushed the paths with a broom held in its trunk, picked up grass cuttings and watered the plants with the aid of a can. Its dexterity and extraordinary intelligence did not end there. The Duke’s guests were entertained after dinner as the elephant pulled the cork from the port bottle and handed it to the butler. Unfortunately, like many elephants, it developed a taste for alcohol and died of consumption in 1829.
Even as I realised I was fantasising I felt a presence behind me. Aditya settled himself beside me and we gazed in silence at Tara.
‘You know, Aditya,’ I said eventually, ‘I …’
‘I know what you are thinking, Mark,’ he interrupted. ‘I feel the same. She has become part of me as well.’
‘What are we going to do?’ I asked desperately.
‘I don’t know. But Sonepur will be full of elephant experts, and I give you my word we will find a solution there.’ Unable to shake off the feeling of unease, I went to bed.
Suddenly, late in the night, the fly of the tent was ripped open and Bhim tumbled drunkenly inside. ‘No time left,’ he shouted urgently. ‘Journey soon over. Raja-sahib learn ride Mummy like good mahout. I watch today. No good.’ He climbed on to Aditya’s back, hooked his legs around his waist and proceeded to give a demonstration of toe movements. ‘Daddy now Mummy,’ he cried. ‘Watch good, Raja-sahib, Bhim show you.’ For the next half hour Aditya’s legs
were kneaded and crushed and his kneecaps grazed from the pressure of Bhim’s horny toenails. Eventually Bhim exhausted himself and passed out.
‘At least he’s keen,’ I remarked to Aditya as we carried him back to his tent.
‘We were lucky to find him, Mark,’ he replied. ‘He cares.’
We climbed back into the tent. I was just falling asleep when a long, sinuous shape slid past the back of the tent, pressing against my head, which was wedged against the canvas. I sat bolt upright and shook Aditya. There was no need. He had felt it as well. I crawled quickly towards the front of the tent but Aditya grabbed me.
‘Stay inside,’ he said calmly, and yelled at Indrajit to investigate. A wild commotion followed. Then Indrajit poked his head in holding something long and bloody.
‘Nag,’ he said happily. ‘I get it’ – and he held up a five-foot cobra.
It was now getting cold in the mornings. We started later and later, waiting for the sun to rise, before facing the icy cold water when bathing Tara. We travelled slowly northwards passing people preparing to celebrate Dussehra, the festival which commemorates the victory of the warrior goddess, Durga, the consort of Shiva, over the buffalo-demon, Mahiasura. Drunkenly, they lay in the shade of large trees where hooch stalls had been set up. The powerful smell of ‘handia’ or ‘raci’, as it is known in Bihar, hung in the hot air. With nose and trunk filled respectively with this irresistible temptation, both Bhim and Tara were finding it hard not to stop.
One evening we became part of a travelling circus. As we set up camp we were joined by a band of roving snake-charmers, delightful, gregarious rogues sartorially resplendent in bright yellow turbans decorated with feathers. Around their necks on beaded strings hung little leather pouches containing remedial herbs to cure snake bites. They carried their reptiles in circular, flat wicker boxes; six cobras, a krait and two lazy pythons.
Their presence attracted an even larger crowd than usual who watched spellbound as the cobras undulated hissing from the boxes and danced to the rhythm of little wooden drums. Bhim, not to be outdone by this slick showmanship, delighted the crowd further by coaxing a variety of sounds out of Tara both from her front and rear end.
Once out of the intoxication of the tribal belt, we crossed a landscape bleached white from the smoke of a large cement factory. Nearing the town of Chaibasa, we could almost have been in England, on a sharp, sunny, frosty morning. Each leaf and blade of grass was covered in a fine white powder that sparkled in the sunlight. To avoid this white wasteland we took a small back road. Spanning it was a tall wooden bridge under which a fast river flowed.
I urged Tara forward. After putting one foot cautiously down, she backed away. No inducement could make her cross it. Without me so much as uttering a command, she simply took over and wandered further up the river bank. After testing the depth she splashed over. On the other side we met a man who told us that the bridge was unsafe. It was now only used by pedestrians and cyclists. Three weeks ago a taxi driver had driven his vehicle halfway across and the timbers had suddenly splintered. Luckily he had managed to reverse to safety.
Similar incidents of an elephant’s extreme cautiousness have been recorded. One was during the Sepoy rebellion in 1857. A general, riding an elephant, had been leading his army towards a bridge which spanned a deep ravine. Similarly, persuasion proved useless – the elephant refused to cross. The general, trusting his elephant’s sagacity, had the structure examined, finding that the enemy had cut away the main supports.
The outskirts of Chaibasa reminded me of an English country village. In British days the town had been the centre of administration for south-eastern Bengal. We crossed green fields dotted with clumps of giant mango and taller Peepul trees. In the distance the spire of a church trembled in the heat haze; fine sturdy trees, shading broad boulevards, gave relief from the hot sun and made a passing snack for Tara. It must have been a pleasant place to be stationed. But according to the Bengal District Gazetteers, a Mr Rickards wrote in 1854, ‘There is everything in Chaibasa to make a person want to leave it … it has not a single attraction.’ And a Dr Bell in 1868 added, ‘those officers who have mastered the Ho language and have become intimate with the people like this station, but with the executive services of Bengal generally it is regarded much in the light of a penal settlement.’
At a small bank we stopped to change travellers’ cheques. The manager could not understand why I wanted to travel through his state. ‘When God created Bihar, Mr Shand,’ he told me, ‘He was in a very bad mood.’
The exquisite church, whose spire we had seen shimmering in the distance, was of the Lutheran order and still retained its original stained-glass windows. Built a hundred and eighty years ago, it had an aura of dignity and simplicity, quite unlike its Roman Catholic rival nearby, a modern atrocity glittering like a seaside fun palace, complete with an ornate grotto-like shrine in which the Virgin Mary was lit by red and blue lights. Inside, converted tribals polished an already gleaming marble floor in which the giant gem-studded cross was reflected.
As we left Chaibasa for Seraikella, where we had been invited to stay by the Raja, we stopped to watch a game of cricket played by some college boys. A fine pull through mid-wicket sent the ball skimming towards us. It stopped just in front of Tara. She eyed this foreign object with interest and then cautiously rolled it around with the tip of her trunk. Satisfied the ball was inedible she stamped on it, embedding it into the hard ground. A group of players had by now run over. They stood in front of her silently, undecided about what they should do. One of them, braver than the rest, stepped forward.
‘Excuse me, sir,’ he asked politely. ‘Um, could we be having our ball back. It is the only one we have.’
‘Of course, I am sorry,’ I said confidently, commanding Tara to move back and dig out the ball. Nothing happened. She stood firmly in place, flapping her ears. I repeated the command. Again she ignored me. I dismounted, rapped her on the trunk and dug the ball out myself. ‘Here you are,’ I said, embarrassed and furious at her behaviour, tossing it back to them.
‘Maybe your elephant is liking playing cricket,’ one of them suggested with a laugh.
‘Oh yes, she is really very clever.’ Taking the ball back, I tossed it at Tara. She did nothing. There was a soft thud as it hit her in the centre of her trunk. I repeated the manoeuvre to no avail. Eventually, I threw the ball back to the players. ‘She’s just out of practice.’
‘You old bag,’ I whispered to her. ‘You let me down. You may be a slow learner, but that was pathetic. After all you are an Indian elephant. You should bloody well know how to play cricket.’
My accusations were a little unfair. Although an elephant is slow to learn, with practice it will repeat almost anything faultlessly, just like the amazing elephant cricket team that the famous animal trainer John Grindl of Bertram Mills’s Circus succeeded in coaching. In his book Elephants Richard Carrington records that a pair of elephants would take up their stations at opposite ends of the arena, one with a cap and pads and holding a bat in his trunk, while the other bowled. On either side four or five others were ranged as fielders. At the word of command the bowler threw the ball down the pitch and the batsman took a ferocious swipe at it with his trunk. More often than not the bat connected and the elephant would plod down the arena for a run. Meanwhile, one of the fielding elephants would stop the ball and throw it at the stumps. It took Grindl several months of patient effort to perfect his act. He began by standing in front of the batting elephant, grasping both bat and trunk in his own hands. Another man would then bowl the ball and Grindl would guide the elephant’s trunk to hit it. After many hundreds of attempts, the elephant grasped the idea and hit the ball on its own. A similar technique was employed with the bowler and fielders. Thereafter there was no holding them, and they would play the game with enormous enthusiasm.
In the blistering heat the road to Seraikella stretched before us unendingly. My stiffness had now almost vanished. Hard yellow
calluses decorated the ends of my toes, but the sides of my legs were blue from bruising, where Tara’s great ears hammered ceaselessly against them.
I was beginning to feel comfortable with her and perhaps she with me. My self-consciousness was vanishing and I barked at her fiercely when she tried to steal paddy or slow down unnecessarily. Considering she was supposed to be a Koonki elephant, she moved remarkably slowly and I had continually to work on her to achieve an even pace. Gradually the habits of a beggar elephant were dying and I felt she was acquiring a new pride.
En route we picked up our first hitch-hiker, a young tribal who displayed great excitement on seeing a large dead snake in the middle of the road.
‘What on earth was that all about?’ I asked Aditya.
‘Our friend has expressed a wish that the snake would come alive and bite him.’
‘What …!’
‘He believes that it belongs to the lowest caste of snakes. It is, in fact, an untouchable. Therefore once our friend bears this mark, all other snakes will avoid him.’
We dropped off our logical companion on the outskirts of Seraikella. By the time we entered the town it was dark. Power-cuts added to the confusion as Tara picked her way with uncanny sureness, waving her trunk constantly as a blind man uses his stick. Elephants are short-sighted animals and rely on their remarkable proboscis to sense rather than see their way. At one moment we padded silently in a complete black-out, the next we found ourselves in the middle of a busy, brightly lit street. At the sudden sight of this huge animal, bicyclists fell off their machines and passersby shouted in alarm. A man on a brand new red Vespa suddenly swung out in front of us.
‘Welcome to Seraikella. I am relation of the King of the princely state of Seraikella. Excuse me,’ he added with an embarrassed laugh, ‘that is not quite correct. I am relation of the ex-King of the ex-princely state of Seraikella. Please follow me.’ Guided by this curious outrider, we made our way through a maze of twisting streets eventually arriving at a pair of large wooden gates, which were thrown open.
