The Elephant Festival takes over the city of Jaipur every year. The animals are draped with jewellery and given majestic multicolour makeovers (complete with pedicures), before doing a procession through the streets. Later they race, play elephant polo and take part in a human v animal tug-of-war. Charles Freger travelled to Rajasthan to get a sneak peek
![The extraordinary painted elephants of India – in pictures](https://cdn-ak-scissors.b.st-hatena.com/image/square/cbc1cbc8e634ab01469b752e3444617e1a9e3348/height=288;version=1;width=512/https%3A%2F%2Fi.guim.co.uk%2Fimg%2Fmedia%2F7b69a46f569e51d400694be74b0c3d52ab10fd20%2F0_0_2560_1535%2Fmaster%2F2560.jpg%3Fwidth%3D1200%26height%3D630%26quality%3D85%26auto%3Dformat%26fit%3Dcrop%26overlay-align%3Dbottom%252Cleft%26overlay-width%3D100p%26overlay-base64%3DL2ltZy9zdGF0aWMvb3ZlcmxheXMvdGctYWdlLTIwMTUucG5n%26enable%3Dupscale%26s%3D8f5d61134a37ad8626146e8cab69132e)