Dasara festival mood sets in, elephants to arrive soon for Jumbo Savari

Mysuru: This royal city is back in the Dasara mood for which it has become a well-known name across the globe. The colour, touch of royal splendour, the Jamboo Savari, the food and many splendoured things will open up during the 12-day Dasara festivities. The Palace board headed by a deputy director rank official is now fully in the grip of organising the festivities. As the first step the forest department has been asked to send a group of elephants that will take part in the Jamboo Savari and it appears this time also the 57-year-old Abhimanyu clearly a heavyweight will bear the golden howdah with the golden idol of Chamundeshwari, the presiding deity of the city of Mysuu. As usual, 14 elephants will take part in the Jamboo Savari. They will soon arrive in the city and lodged in the Amba Vilas palace premises in the city.

The list of elephants that the forest department has cleared for the Jamboo Savari includes Gopalaswamy (39 years) Abhimanyu(57 years) Bheema (22 years)Mahendra(38 years) -all from Mattigodu elephant camp in Chamarajanagar. Arjuna (63 years old) from Balle Elephant camp, Vikram(59 years) Dhananjaya (44 years) Kaveri (45 years) Gopi(41 years) SriRama(40years), Vijaya (63 years)-all from Dubare elephant camp in Kodagu district. Chaitra (49years) Lakshmi (21 years) and Parthasarathi (18 years) from Ramapura elephant camps will start their journey towards Mysuru soon the palace board officials stated. They will start from Veera hosahalli of Hunasuru taluk in Mysuru district on Sunday and will arrive in the city on the same day. Together they make the main event - 'Jamboo Savari' world famous.

On Vijayadashami- the culmination of the Navarathri festival they march to a distance of 4.5 kilometres from Amba Vilas Palace to Bannimantap. The strongest of them carry the Golden Howdah with the idol of Chamundeshwari- the presiding deity of Mysuru city. This time the responsibility will be shouldered for the second time by 'Abhimanyu' 59-year-old Tusker. He is the lineage of elephants of great strength including Drona, Balarama and Arjuna.

He is not new to the Jamboo Savari. "He had been in the task in one or the other way for the last 22 years. His last assignment was to draw the 'Ane Gaadi' which is a trailer full of musicians of the royal court. He is strong and calm and well-behaved, the most important characteristic of Abhimanyu is that he is daring and afraid of no animal of his own kind and others. He is physically more suited to carry the Golden Howdah.