World Animal Day: PETA India’s Life-Size Animatronic Elephant, Ellie, Voiced by Dia Mirza, Launched at Pune School

To mark World Animal Day (4 October), children at St Mary’s School in Pune received a special visit from Ellie, a stunningly realistic life-size animatronic elephant voiced by actor Dia Mirza, as part of a unique PETA India child empathy initiative. While blinking her eyes and flapping her ears just like a real elephant, Ellie tells children the story of real elephants who are separated from their mothers as babies and describes the physical punishments they endure in the circus. Ellie’s “personal” story has a feel-good ending, as she is rescued and lives happily ever after at a sanctuary.

Actor Dia Mirza first launched Ellie in May at Jamnabai Narsee International School, Mumbai. Since then, Ellie has met over 27,000 young learners at various private, public, and international schools in Mumbai. She’ll now be interacting with thousands of children in well-known Pune schools. Further to St Mary’s School, she’ll also visit CP Goenka International, Billabong High International, Little Millennium, Victorious Kidss Educares, Bharati Vidyapeeth, Siddhant International, and Crimson Anisha Global schools.

Captive elephants used for circuses, rides, weddings, ceremonies, and other forms of entertainment are beaten into submission and kept in chains when not in use. They often attack humans out of frustration at their confinement. They are rarely given adequate food, water, or veterinary care, and the years spent chained and standing in one position on hard concrete surfaces commonly leads to painful and crippling foot ailments and bone and joint diseases like arthritis.

PETA India also runs a free humane education programme, Compassionate Citizen, designed to help school students aged 8 to 12 years better understand and appreciate animals. It has been used by over 2 lakh schools, reaching approximately 92 million children across India.

Ellie will be in Pune from 5 to 14 October. Educators who would like Ellie to visit their schools can write to Meenakshi Narang at [email protected].