Sri Lanka already wrote the plan that saves its elephants, so why does one die every day?
The Issue
Sri Lanka already wrote the perfect plan that saves its elephants. President Dissanayake, Minister Patabendi: use it.
On Saturday 20 June 2026, the day Northampton Saints lifted the Premiership trophy in front of a jubilant crowd, an elephant named Digha died in Sri Lanka, electrocuted on an illegal fence wired directly to the mains. Two months later, that same team is on Sri Lankan soil for the first time in its history, touring alongside the Asia Pacific Lions and building to a marquee match at the Colombo Racecourse International Stadium on 28 August.
The world's rugby community is watching Sri Lanka this week for reasons that have nothing to do with what happened to Digha. Here's what else is happening there right now.
In 2021, Sri Lanka's own leading elephant scientists, led by Dr. Prithiviraj Fernando, handed the government a fully costed National Action Plan for human-elephant conflict: fence farms and villages instead of fencing elephants into parks, and phase out the elephant drives that had failed for decades. It worked. When it was funded and partially implemented in 2024, elephant deaths fell for the first time in a decade.
President Dissanayake took office that September. Within weeks, implementation stopped. Drives resumed. Trenches went back up around protected areas, and firearms were issued to farmers on smaller and smaller plots of land. In 2025, 438 elephants and 158 people died, the worst year ever recorded. The government now talks about "clearing elephant corridors," which conservationists warn could mean stripping the cover elephants need to move, not the encroachment blocking their path. Sri Lanka has fewer than 100 tuskers left, maybe as few as 50 to 60, and at this rate the ones that remain could be gone within a generation.
Dr. Fernando is part of the process deciding what comes next. That process is happening right now, this month, under President Dissanayake's own environment ministry, and the drives and firearms already back in use are the exact approach his plan was written to end.
We're calling on President Dissanayake and Minister Patabendi to follow the science their own scientists already produced, and to back and implement the National Action Plan that was working before it was dropped on their watch. The world is watching this week. It will notice if nothing changes.
PLEASE Sign to ask President Dissanayake and Minister Patabendi: implement the National Action Plan Sri Lanka already has.
233
The Issue
Sri Lanka already wrote the perfect plan that saves its elephants. President Dissanayake, Minister Patabendi: use it.
On Saturday 20 June 2026, the day Northampton Saints lifted the Premiership trophy in front of a jubilant crowd, an elephant named Digha died in Sri Lanka, electrocuted on an illegal fence wired directly to the mains. Two months later, that same team is on Sri Lankan soil for the first time in its history, touring alongside the Asia Pacific Lions and building to a marquee match at the Colombo Racecourse International Stadium on 28 August.
The world's rugby community is watching Sri Lanka this week for reasons that have nothing to do with what happened to Digha. Here's what else is happening there right now.
In 2021, Sri Lanka's own leading elephant scientists, led by Dr. Prithiviraj Fernando, handed the government a fully costed National Action Plan for human-elephant conflict: fence farms and villages instead of fencing elephants into parks, and phase out the elephant drives that had failed for decades. It worked. When it was funded and partially implemented in 2024, elephant deaths fell for the first time in a decade.
President Dissanayake took office that September. Within weeks, implementation stopped. Drives resumed. Trenches went back up around protected areas, and firearms were issued to farmers on smaller and smaller plots of land. In 2025, 438 elephants and 158 people died, the worst year ever recorded. The government now talks about "clearing elephant corridors," which conservationists warn could mean stripping the cover elephants need to move, not the encroachment blocking their path. Sri Lanka has fewer than 100 tuskers left, maybe as few as 50 to 60, and at this rate the ones that remain could be gone within a generation.
Dr. Fernando is part of the process deciding what comes next. That process is happening right now, this month, under President Dissanayake's own environment ministry, and the drives and firearms already back in use are the exact approach his plan was written to end.
We're calling on President Dissanayake and Minister Patabendi to follow the science their own scientists already produced, and to back and implement the National Action Plan that was working before it was dropped on their watch. The world is watching this week. It will notice if nothing changes.
PLEASE Sign to ask President Dissanayake and Minister Patabendi: implement the National Action Plan Sri Lanka already has.
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Petition created on 20 August 2026