CHILLA, June 8: The elephant census being carried out at the Rajaji National Park since last week is turning out to be an extremely difficult operation for wildlife experts.

An integral part of ``Project Elephant'', the census is aimed at enhancing the dwindling population of elephants in the country. But, according to the experts, counting tuskers in their natural habitat is becoming more dangerous than counting tigers.

``In the tiger census carried out last month, we were expected to trace their pug marks (foot impression) much after the beast had already moved away. But here, we have to approach wild elephants up to a distance of about 50 metres to get their exact number. This exposes us to the risk of being attacked by them,'' says deputy wildlife warden Mahendra Singh Negi.

Rajaji Park, set up in 1983, had a population of 281 elephants during the last census two years ago. Results of the ongoing census would be a pointer to the success of Project Elephant, adopted some seven years ago. The census will be completed in three phases and several NGOs and voluntary

organisations have been enrolled to ensure transparency in the process.This reporter was accompanied by Negi and two armed forest guards - Rajpal Singh and D S Rawat - on a Gypsy from Chilla to Munbal while they were conducting the census. First, Negi and his team tried to ascertain the direction of an elephant herd's movement by examining their footprints on the dirt track. Once the the direction was established, they followed the trail into the forest. The jeep was abandoned, and the team walked at least 7 km.

``Hathi!'' exclaimed Negi in a hushed tone. The team had detected a massive tusker about 100 metres away. ``There are more,'' said one of the guards; the team then moved closer to have a better look and, more importantly, jot down their numbers, sex, and location.

Copyright © 1997 Indian Express Newspapers (Bombay) Ltd.