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Mahesh

13/08/22 02:05 AM IST

World Elephant Day

In News 
World Elephant Day is celebrated on 12 August every year to raise awareness about the plight of elephants all over the world. 

Historical background 
  • World Elephant Day was co-founded by Patricia Sims, a Canadian film-maker, with the Elephant Reintroduction Foundation of Thailand, an initiative of HM Queen Sirikit in 2012.
  • As per the 2017 count there are nearly 30000 elephants in India (an increase from the 2012 count)
  • The animals are highly intelligent creatures, similar to apes and dolphins, and are capable of showing emotions such as empathy, grief, and compassion.
  • Among Asian elephants, the Indian elephant is the most widespread, Sri Lankan is the largest and Sumatran is the smallest.
  • Escalation of poaching, Habitat loss, Human-elephant conflict (1,578 people died of elephant attacks in India between 2019-20 and 2021-22), Mistreatment in captivity.
Measures taken 
  • MIKE programme (The Monitoring the Illegal Killing of Elephants (MIKE) programme, 2003): It is an international collaboration for elephant protection.
  • Project Elephant ( centrally sponsored scheme, 1992): To protect elephants and their habitats.
  • SC: Animal have rights of passage and it asked for closure of nearby resorts on the Nilgiris Elephant Corridors.
  • India houses about 60% of all Asian elephants. The number of elephant reserves has risen in the last 8 years.
Source- PIB 

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