Maheswari, the 88-year-old elephant of the zoological park in Thiruvananthapuram, died on Monday morning due to age-related illnesses. The granny jumbo, who had been the inmate of the zoo since 1946 at the age of 20, was one of the main attractions at the facility for years.
The elephant had collapsed on Saturday evening when the keepers were moving her into her enclosure after a bath. The keepers and other employees of the zoo tried their level best to lift her by scooping out the soil under her but could not succeed. later, doctors got Maheswari back on her feet on Sunday night using heavy belts.
A team of veterinarians, headed by zoo doctor Jacob Alexander, attended on her for two days by giving injections and other medicines but they could not save her life. “Despite the best medical aid, we could not keep her alive,” Alexander said. Maheswari breathed her last on Monday at 11.45 am.
Maheswari, who was fondly called Maheswari Amma (Mother Maheswari) by schoolchildren visiting the zoo, had been under special care for over five years after she began to show symptoms of age-related illnesses.
For the past five years, Maheswari had not been able to digest food that elephants normally take. The zoo authorities had been giving her palm fronds after removing the sticks as the advanced age had caused her teeth to lose strength. Maheswari was also not in the habit of eating rice for the simple reason that she did not like it.
Authorities at the zoo said she used to examine every banana she was offered, probably because she thought that tablets could be hidden in them. They said her habits and preferences were very complicated but they never felt bad about it.
When the erstwhile Maharaja of Travancore brought her to the Thiruvananthapuram zoo from an elephant camp in Konni, Pathanamthitta in 1946, she was twenty years old, it is said. Zoo authorities said that she had never created any trouble for them in all these years and for that very reason she was one of the most liked inhabitants of the facility.
Maheswari and her male companion in the zoo, Mumbai-born Rajkumar aka Raju (now 37), were to be taken to the Kottur elephant camp in Thiruvananthapuram district in 2010 as per the norms of the Central Zoo Authority but the zoo managed to get permission to keep the granny elephant. Raju was shifted to Kottur a year ago leaving Maheswari in total solitude.