Elephant safari at the Kaziranga National Park will be closed indefinitely from December 24 (Sunday) until further orders.

According to reports, the decision was taken as a mark of protest against reserving one seat each on an elephant back for the forest department officials.

According to the Kaziranga National Park authorities, a directive was issued by the Assam Forest Department stating that a separate seat should be reserved for forest officials for security purposes. However, the national park authorities claimed this was impossible and they are against the directive.

Further, while speaking on the issue, the authorities claimed that when they went to meet the DFO regarding the reserved seat, they were mistreated. Therefore, the elephant safari has been closed until a fixed solution to the problem is meted out on the issue. The authorities termed the incident as 'unfortunate' for all tourists visiting the national park.