It requires a lot of skill for a puny man to control a mammoth elephant. Mahouts have learned the skill to make the elephants do his bidding by
uttering a command or by a gentle prod with his hands or legs. A rained elephant will turn to the left, when the mahout prods him gently with the toe of his right leg. If the repeats this manoeuvre with his left leg, prodding it to turn right, then the elephant will turn right. If he uses both his big toes to prod the elephant forward, then it moves forward. If the bottom portion of his bare leg is pressed backwards, the elephant takes it as an instruction to move backwards.Mahouts use about 20 words to give commands; they are a mixture of English, Urdu and Malayalam. Lots of elephants are brought from Bihar; they prefer their mahouts to talk to them in the national language-Hindi
