A screengrab taken from the video.

Gulf Today Report

Friday turned out to be a tough day in the office for the forest department in the Indian state of Tamil Nadu's Dharmapuri district, as they were confronted with a herculean task of pulling out a female elephant, who fell into a well.

It all began when a farmer named Venkatachalam heard the cry of an elephant from inside his well.

He immediately called the forest department as he knew he wouldn’t be able to pull out the tusker from a well which was almost 50 feet deep.

A team of forest officials swung into action and pressed two cranes into service immediately to pull the animal out.

It took them almost 16 hours to succeed in their mission.

The video of the operation, which has gone viral, shows the big animal appearing perfectly calm while being lifted out of the well.

The video is earning a lot of praise for the rescue team.

"After hours of operation, which included supplying food also, the elephant is rescued by the forest team. It was a 50-foot deep well.

And credit to the elephant also for her will," Indian Forest Service officer Parveen Kaswan wrote on Twitter.