Padayappa, who flaunts a dominating height and a regal gait apart from many other distinctive masculine characteristics, is admired by local people, elephant lovers and environmentalists alike.Munnar: After a brief interval, wild elephant ‘Padayappa’, notorious for raiding crops and spreading panic among villagers, has returned to Munnar.
The lone tusker marked his return in style the other day by straying into a football field at Kannimala.
Padayappa, who flaunts a dominating height and a regal gait apart from many other distinctive masculine characteristics, is admired by local people, elephant lovers and environmentalists alike.
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He was named after the popular Rajnikanth-starrer movie ‘Padayappa’ (leader in Tamil), for being the matriarch of a herd.
Padayappa, a local favorite, is often sighted along the state highway bordering forest areas within the 50 kilometer radius of Munnar town, Kannimala, Nayamakkadu, Thalayar and Kadalar areas.
According to local people, he has made it a habit to stage a disappearing act once in a while. The elephant lovers in and around Munnar had launched a search for him after he vanished from the area about a year ago.
Padayappa is so calm and gentle and has never caused harm to anyone, local people say.
The veteran jumbo hit the headlines in 2001 when he created a flutter by blocking the convoy of the then chief minister A K Antony while he was returning from Marayur after attending the inauguration of a tribal rehabilitation program.
Occasionally Padayappa would raid farm fields in the area and make off with carrots and bananas. Carrots are his favorite food and his eating style too is peculiar. First he would tear out each clump, and tap them against his raised foreleg to knock off the mud before munching on them.
As he is not able to walk briskly due to a knee injury, his movements are now being closely monitored by forest officials and environmentalists in the area.
