A decision has been taken to establish a new Elephant Transit Home at Kalahagala in Polonnaruwa, on roughly 15 hectares of Department of Forest Conservation land — the first such facility outside Udawalawe, which has been the country’s only one.
Polonnaruwa District Secretary Sujantha Ekanayake said the land will be allocated for the purpose, NewsFirst reported at 12.13 p.m. on Saturday. The site was selected following a survey by an expert committee made up of veterinarians, Forest Conservation Department officers and public representatives.
The journey is the reason
The case for the facility is a transport problem with a clinical consequence.
Ekanayake said moving wild elephant calves from the Northern and North Central provinces to Udawalawe takes between seven and nine hours, and that transporting injured calves over such a period poses a significant risk to their lives.
Newswire reported the same decision on Saturday and puts the saving in concrete terms: the Kalahagala facility is expected to reduce that transfer to about one or two hours before treatment can begin.
The transit home is intended for calves separated from their mothers or injured in disasters — including human-elephant conflict, floods and train accidents.
A conservation argument beyond the travel time
Newswire carries a second rationale that the NewsFirst filing does not.
Dr. Sumith Pilapitiya, former Director General of Wildlife Conservation and an elephant researcher, said the centre would allow calves to be rehabilitated and released into wildlife reserves in their own regions — helping preserve the natural separation of Sri Lanka’s three main elephant subpopulations.
That is a genetic and behavioural argument rather than a logistical one: a single national facility concentrates rescued calves from across the island and releases them into one area, mixing populations that are otherwise distinct.
Newswire is a wire aggregator and does not count toward this article’s source rating; Pilapitiya’s comments are attributed to it rather than independently obtained.
Local economic case
Ekanayake said the transit home will help boost tourism in the Polonnaruwa District and create jobs for local residents, including through services such as supplying the food required by the calves — the model that has grown up around Udawalawe, where the existing transit home’s milk formula costs have themselves been a recurring issue.
It arrives alongside a separate push on elephant protection: the Environment Ministry agreed on 23 October to a joint programme with the Tri-Forces, including an operations room at Army Headquarters.
Not reported
Neither filing gives a timeline, a cost, a capacity, or a funding source, and neither says which agency will operate the facility — the Department of Wildlife Conservation runs Udawalawe, but the land here is being released by the Forest Conservation Department.
Neither reports whether Cabinet approval has been obtained, nor whether any forest cover will be cleared for the 15-hectare site.
Sources: New Elephant Transit Home to be established in Polonnaruwa — NewsFirst, October 24, Polonnaruwa to get new elephant transit home — Newswire, October 24.
