Silchar, Nov. 24:The camel which was brought to Assam from Rajasthan for sacrifice during Id, was loaded on a truck last night to transport it to a shelter in Delhi arranged by animal rights activist Maneka Gandhi.

Police said the camel was brought to Katlicherra, about 15km from district headquarters town of Hailakandi district, by Anawar Hossain Laskar, an employee of the irrigation department and contractor.

The Hailakandi district administration and the district forest office then together set out on an initiative to find a shelter for the animal.

Their search ended on Saturday when Hailakandi deputy commissioner Bhuban Chandra Bora pleaded with the BJP MP and animal activist Maneka Gandhi in New Delhi over telephone for the camel’s rehabilitation.

She promptly agreed to arrange for its upkeep and stay in an animal home in the capital named Sanjay Gandhi Animal Care Centre. There was much drama when the camel was loaded on the spacious truck at the bus terminus in the district headquarters town of Hailakandi yesterday, on its way to the national capital.

The animal suddenly turned a little hostile and refused to mount the truck with the tarpaulins spread on its floor and its staple food — a mound of thorny leaf of the green berry — stacked in one corner of the carrier.

The district forest officer of Hailakandi, Dilip Das, said a pile of sand was spread at the embarkation point of the truck that allowed the camel to properly take its standing position on a perch.

The animal was then slowly coaxed to mount the truck much to the relief of the onlookers, animal lovers and administration and forest officials. Two mahouts of the Hailakandi forest office accompanied the camel in the truck ride to New Delhi, an exercise that is estimated to cost the exchequer Rs 70,000.This truck is expected to reach Delhi next Monday, sources in the Hailakandi forest office said.