Aanakkada (Malayalm/ Tamil for elephant shop) at Kanchikode on Kerala-Tamil Nadu border is a shop dedicated to elephants. There isn’t any live elephants in the shop but it is full of stories about elephants.
People who come to this tea shop could order tea, coffee or nannari sarbath ( a cool drink made of natural herbs) depending on the time of the day. While cherishing the drink, ED Ramesh, (40), the owner of the shop would enthral the visitors with hundreds of real life stories about elephants. There are more than 200 colour photographs of elephants that are regular features in poorams (Malayalam for temple festivals) in the State. The shop has a collection of books on elephants, including Mathanga leela, a comprehensive work on Asian elephants.
“I personally know more than 300 elephants in Kerala and I interact with them whenever we meet during poorams,” Ramesh told The Pioneer. A glance is enough for Ramesh to give us the characteristics of the pachyderm. When pointed out that herds of elephants are destroying crops of farmers in Tamil Nadu’s Krishnagiri and Tiruppur districts and that they are violent, Ramesh chose to disagree. “Please do not forget that you have encroached into the elephants’ territory. Moreover, the elephant has an extraordinary power of smell. They can easily identify jackfruits, bananas and similar fruits from a distance of five or six kilometres,” said Ramesh.
Ramesh’s interest in elephants began when he was four years of age. His paternal uncle Sankaran had a passion for elephants and was an authority on them. Ramesh was attached to Sankaran and that led to his expanding the horizon of his knowledge about elephants. “I remember Ramesh pleading with his parents to get him an elephant when he was hardly six. It was with great difficulty his father Dharman resolved the issue,” said lonappan, an auto driver and long time family friend.
“I vividly remember seeing elephants from Kerala being transported to New Delhi for the 1982 Asian Games. A special train had been deployed to take them to the national capital,” said Ramesh. He becomes vocal when he speaks about Kannambulli Balanarayanan, the biggest elephant in the continent and Thiruvambadi Shivasundar, which holds the title of the biggest elephant in South India.
According to Ramesh, the wild elephants are not at all aggressive. They come out of the forests in search of food because of shortage of food. There is no water in the watering holes frequented by them in the forests. But the tamed elephants are well taken care of by their owners," he pointed out.
An incident featuring Balanarayanan to which Ramesh was privy to speaks lot about the man-animal relation. The elephant was like a member of the Kannambilli family, says Ramesh. "Balanarayanan had a special liking for ParavathyAmma, the mother of Balan who owned the elephant. When an ailing ParvathyAmma was admitted to the hospital, she had only one wish. To see Balanarayanan for the last time. The elephant was brought to the hospital premises. ParvathyAmma met him at the foyer where the tusker who was literally weeping kissed her with his trunk. Within minutes the lady breathed her last and the scene was unbearable," remembers Ramesh.
One of the prized possessions of Ramesh is a larger than life poster of Guruvayur Padmanabhan, a legendary elephant owned by the famous lord Krishna Temple in Guruvayyur. "I identified an elephant from the negative of its photograph," Ramesh says with an innocent smile. Well, a visit to Anakkada and a nannari serbath spiced with Ramesh's memoirs is sufficient to turn one into an elephant lover.