IMPORTANT POINT
The duty of citizens and the State to exhibit compassion to animals as enshrined in Art.51A of the Constitution and the importance of fundamental duties and their enforcement, especially in matters relating to environment and wildlife protection.

“There is a very sacred relationship between nature and humanity. The culture of respecting nature has been the identity of our country. In India, nature and culture have been linked to each other and have been receiving nourishment from each other. Elephants have been most respected in our tradition. It has been considered a symbol of prosperity. It is the National Heritage Animal of India. Therefore, protecting elephants is an important part of our national responsibility to preserve our national heritage.”

Smt. Droupadi Murmu, The President of India

It is in sharp contrast to the above observations made by the executive head of our nation on 7th April 2023 that we find ourselves dealing with the plea raised in this petition, preferred by the MLA from the Nenmara Legislative Assembly Constituency, who is stated to be representing the local inhabitants of the Muthalamada Grama Panchayath that borders the Parambikulam Tiger Reserve, to review our earlier order that directed a translocation of the wild elephant - “Arikkomban”. Our earlier order dated 05.04.2023 was issued in the wake of apprehensions voiced by the residents of the Panchayaths bordering the Anayirangal region, who were apprehensive of the foraging activities of the elephant in their settlements, and the decision to tranquilise, radio-collar and translocate the elephant to the Parambikulam Tiger Reserve was taken based on the opinion of experts in the field. In this petition, however, the assumption of the petitioner is that the elephant is habituated to foraying in human settlements and his apprehension is that it will now take to foraging in the human settlements within the Muthalamada Grama Panchayath.

2. At the very outset we might observe that we find the apprehension of the petitioner herein to be baseless as there is no material produced by him that would suggest that such anticipated behaviour of the elephant is a certainty. We are also appalled by the total insensitivity demonstrated to the plight of the animal in question, which has been directed to be translocated from its original habitat to a new one only because there is every likelihood that the availability of plentiful natural food and water resources there would deter it from foraging in human settlements. The fact that the elephant will be radio-collared and its movements monitored by the forest/wildlife officials ought to have sufficed to allay the apprehensions of the petitioner, as the ‘surprise’ element of any conflict situation is effectively removed through the monitoring mechanism instituted and now in place.

3. It concerns us that the arguments advanced before us in these proceedings fly in the face of the express provisions of our Constitution that oblige our citizens to exhibit compassion to animals. We might observe that it is not mere co-incidence that Art.51A of our constitution uses the expression ‘compassion’ and ‘humanism’ while enumerating the duties expected of the citizenry towards the environment and living creatures. In the true spirit of humanism, and through invoking our feelings of empathy and compassion, what the constitution exhorts us to do is to develop a sympathetic understanding as a cognitive mode to decipher nature’s own language, to see organic life as it is, not as translated into manipulable objects for human use. It is only through a duty based legal approach that obligates human beings to invoke their feelings of sympathy, empathy and compassion while trying to understand those legitimate interests of animals that require safeguarding, that our nation can succeed in enhancing the inherent spirit of humanism in the citizenry.

4. While there was some ambiguity in our jurisprudence as to whether the fundamental duties under our constitution could be enforced through a court of law, it is now fairly well settled that fundamental duties are as important as fundamental rights and that our courts will not look askance when it comes to their enforcement. When called up