The sad, sad story of Raja the elephant...

[LadySunshine]

This story will touch your heart. No animal should have to endure this kind of life !
This is the story of an Indian elephant, captured and taken away from his mother when he was a tiny baby.
He was then chained and beaten until his spirit was totally broken, and he was obedient to his captors. After that, he was used for work, or any other purpose they needed his strength and abilities.
He was sold over and over through the years, often being starved and abused; and when he was found, he was being used as a begging elephant for tourists visiting India. He ate about anything th tourists fed him, including plastic and paper.
The chains on his legs had spikes, which cut into him as he walked, making painful sores so it hurt him every time he tried to take a step.

When the rescuers came to free him, and the chains started coming off of his legs; Raja understood that he was finally being rescued, and huge tears of joy and gratitude rolled down his leathery cheeks....

[ame=http://youtu.be/6_sszsBdpso]Midnight rescue operation - Raju the elephant cried on the day he was released from chains - YouTube[/ame]

 

[Mr Natural]

People suck.

 

[Luddly Neddite]

Here's a newer pic of Raja -

 

[waltky]

The oldest elephant in Japan died Thursday at the age of 69...

World's 'Loneliest Elephant' Dies After Decades In Concrete Enclosure
5/27/2016 - The oldest elephant in Japan, dubbed the world’s "loneliest elephant" by animal welfare activists, died Thursday at the age of 69.

Hanako the elephant lived at Tokyo’s Inokashira Park Zoo for 62 years, according to The Japan Times. Thailand initially gave her as a gift to Japan in 1949, and she lived at Ueno Zoo five years before being transferred to Inokashira in 1954. But it wasn’t until last year that Hanako came to international attention, after Canadian animal advocate Ulara Nakagawa visited the zoo and wrote a blog post for Medium titled "Hanako the Elephant: 61 Years (and Counting) Alone in a Concrete Prison."

Hanako, whose name meant "flower child," is seen earlier this year at Inokashira Park Zoo.​

Nakagawa accused the zoo of keeping Hanako isolated with no mental stimulation or enrichment. “Totally alone in a small, barren, cement enclosure with absolutely NO comfort or stimulation provided, she just stood there almost lifeless  --  like a figurine,” she wrote. “There was absolutely nothing else for her to do. It was beyond painful to take in.” Elephants are highly social animals and form close, lifelong family bonds in the wild.

Following Nakagawa's blog post, more than 450,000 people signed a petition asking that Hanako be moved to a Thailand sanctuary. When the zoo said the elephant's advanced age would make a transfer impossible, animal advocates asked that the zoo at least put some green plants in Hanako's enclosure and allow her to interact with other animals, The Telegraph reports. A crowdfunding campaign raised nearly $40,000 to go toward improving the elephant’s life. Zoo manager Hidemasa Hori told CNN in March that people who signed the petition “didn’t know much about Hanako.” He called her a “killer elephant,” citing two instances where she'd trampled someone to death -- a drunk man who'd entered her enclosure, in 1956; and a zookeeper, in 1960. Hori also said that Hanako had become bad-tempered in her old age and needed to be kept in isolation.

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