Why It Matters | Oscar win for ‘The Elephant Whisperers’ Premium

“I stand here today to speak for the sacred bond between us and our natural world,” Kartiki Gonsalves said.

Bomman at the burial site of elephants and currently in a mission to rescue the two orphaned calves in Marandahalli in Dharmapuri on Monday. 13 March 2023. | Photo Credit: N Bashkaran

The facts

• Indian documentary The Elephant Whisperers emerged as the winner in the Best Documentary Short category at the 95th Academy Awards, among the five films nominated.
• Directed by Kartiki Gonsalves and produced by Sikhya Entertainment, the film premiered on November 9, 2022, and was released on Netflix December 8, 2022.
• The documentary was shortlisted for Doc NYC and nominated for the 2022 IDA Documentary Awards. It was also nominated for the Hollywood Music in Media Awards for its musical score, which was composed by Sven Faulconer. 

The context

• The documentary shows the lives of Bomman and Bellie, two Indigenous people entrusted with the care of two orphaned baby elephants, Raghu and Ammu. It portrays the bond between the elephants and the couple as they nurture the calves.
• The film also highlights the stunning beauty of Tamil Nadu’s Mudumalai National Park and gives a peek into the lives of the Kattunayakan, an indigenous community that inhabits parts of South India.

Why it matters

• Using the national park and the Theppakadu Elephant camp as the backdrop, the film delves into themes of conservation, human-animal conflict and coexistence between nature and humans.
• It also emphasises the importance of involving indigenous communities in the process of conservation.
• The documentary also sheds light on the incessant human-animal conflict, with Raghu losing his mother to electrocution and Bellie losing her partner to a tiger attack.
• The film is also the first Indian production that has won an Academy Award for the Documentary Short category.