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‘My first memory of elephants is my dad sitting me down and telling me that he had bought me a pet,’ shares Ayesha Shand, the 26-year-old daughter of the late philanthropist Mark Shand, her eyes lighting up as she remembers her father. ‘I was really excited - thinking maybe it was a dog,’ she pauses for dramatic effect, laughing. ‘And he said, “no, actually, I’ve got you an elephant”. I went to school and told everyone and no one believed me - my teacher even told me off for telling a lie!’
If you knew Ayesha’s father, the gift wouldn’t be such a punchline. The brother of HRH the Duchess of Cornwall, Shand shared a strong affinity with elephants. The love ran so deep, he spent his life dedicated to conserving them in Asia, setting up his own charity, The Elephant Family, with co-founder, Ruth Ganesh in 2002. As Her Royal Highness recalls, 'In 1988, on a visit to India, something happened that was to change my brother’s life. Mark arrived in Bhubaneswar, the capital of Orissa in Eastern India, and rescued a beautiful female elephant from a life of begging and misery. Her name was Tara. They embarked on a thousand mile journey across the North of India (which he recalls in his best-selling book,