International Conference on Asian Elephants in Culture & Nature
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://repository.kln.ac.lk/handle/123456789/14026
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Item Imperialism and the Elephant in Burma: An Analytical Perception of George Orwell's ‘Shooting the Elephant’(Centre for Asian Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Dasture, P.; Aniruddha, J.S.Burma had been under British occupation through 1824 to 1948, the British rule brought social, economic, cultural and administrative changes; during which it was also administered as a province of India. Moulmein, the capital of British Burma, is the setting of George Orwell’s famous 1936 memoir ‘Shooting the Elephant’. Orwell, born in India and brought up in Britain, held the post of Assistant Superintendent in the British Indian Imperial Police in Burma. Moulmein was full of elephants employed to haul logs in the timber firms; ordinary tamed elephants, for centuries had been part of Burmese life. The essay describes the experience and anguish of the English narrator, possibly Orwell himself, called upon to shoot an aggressive elephant while working as a police officer in Burma. The story is looked upon as an allegory for British imperialism. Orwell’s other publications, like this one too, generally reflected the mood of the times and relied heavily on contemporary happenings. Through the analysis of the essay in question, this paper intends to bring to the fore the importance of the elephants in Burmese society, with the imperial spectre looming large over the political horizon. Where the elephant represents a symbol of the oppression of the Burmese society, its death is a parallel of how the British Empire struggled to suppress the natives.Item The Indian War Elephant: Fascinating Tales from its Historical Past(Centre for Asian Studies, University of Kelaniya, Sri Lanka, 2016) Dasture, P.One of the most interesting and unusual uses of animals in history was the engagement of war elephants. Working with animals on the battlefield had both advantages and disadvantages and this was particularly true of the war elephant, whose usage through time had varying results. The elephant was the only animal that humankind used as a significant combatant, systematically and on a large scale, India being one of the first countries to utilize it. Horses were never actual fighters, rather vehicles for carrying soldiers in the battle. The elephants were military units with elephant-mounted troops; they were first employed in India, the practice subsequently spread across south-east Asia and even westwards towards the Mediterranean. Through a good part of Indian history, the elephant has been a famous participant as a highly valued war machine in military actions. In India, elephants were not only fighters but also siege weapons. From the fighting tower, to the howdah, to the armour to the tusk swords, all made the elephant rather formidable. This paper intends to look at the necessity of the increased employability of the war elephants in Indian history; their functions, advantages and disadvantages as well as the countermeasures used against them. This paper narrates tales of battles from the Indian past where the war elephant was an integral part of the outcome of the combat. Moreover, the elephant when not in war was also used as a medium of imparting punishment, where the perpetrator would publically be crushed to death under the foot of an elephant.