Thursday 18 June 2020 – A wild elephant is found dead in Rajgarh district of Chhattisgarh. The carcass was found in Behrampur village under Chhal forest range of Dharamjaigarh division. Arun Kumar Pandey, the Additional Principal Chief Conservator of Forest says the elephant did not die due to natural causes and there were no external wounds. The post mortem report will reveal the cause of death soon.
Tuesday, 16 June 2020 – An elephant died after coming in contact with a live electric wire on a farm in Raigarh district. Five people including three from the state power company were booked.
Tuesday, 16 June 2020 – An elephant calf died after it got stuck in a marshland in Dhamtari district of Chhattisgarh. The calf belonged to a herd of around 15 elephants that were passing the area. Local villagers and the forest department tried to rescue the baby elephant but she was stuck and could not be taken out.
Wednesday, 10 June 2020 – Elephant found dead in Balrampur district. The report showed death was due to toxicity, infection, and cardiac arrest. It is believed that the jumbo died on June 6 but the body was recovered on 10th after a foul smell started coming from the area.
Three state forest officials and a guard were suspended and show cause notice was sent to divisional forest officer for dereliction of duty.
Pandey says he found a bag of fertilizers under the body of the animal and it is possible that it died after consumption of the chemical toxins in the fertilizers.
Tuesday, 9 June 2020 – Carcasses of one female elephant found in a different area of the Pratappur forest range.
Monday, 8 June 2020 – A female pregnant elephant carrying nearly close to term died in a forest near Ganeshpur of Surajpur district.
Though elephant numbers have increased in the last ten years in Chhatisgarh from 225 to 290, so has increased the regular encounter between people and the jumbos because of depleting food and resources inside the forests. North Chhatisgarh’s coal-rich forests in the Surguja region is home to around 240 wild elephants. There has been frequent human-elephant conflict in the area mostly between farmers and the jumbos.
Also Read: In Pics – An Elephant’s Long Walk to Freedom
A villager, Pradeep Marawi from Balrampur tells The Indian Express that people die because of not following basic common sense when encountering an animal, but jumbos die because farmers sometimes leave potassium and other chemicals in the soil around the fields or even let current flow.
Since 2001, 157 elephants have died in the state, 30% due to electrocution. While some are due to farmers deliberately placing live wires around their fields to safeguard the crop from nightly raids, another reason is the low lying cables around the forests.
According to Naidunia, most electricity cables in the region are not at the requisite height, far from an animal’s reach and they are also not covered. In a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed in Chhattisgarh court, the power transmission company said it was ready to cover the cables and raise their heights in the forest department could invest Rs. 1674 crore for the project.
Meanwhile, the state government has formed a panel to investigate the death of the elephants who will send their report within a month. India’s environment minister Prakash Javadkar has also said that the forest department in planning a food resource project where plants like bamboo will be planted within the forest to keep elephants inside and reduce the conflicts with people.
Also Read: How Bees, Orange and Pepper are saving Wild Elephants
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