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Elephants create havoc

BHUBANESWAR: One person has died and four others have been injured in Nirakarpur area of Puri district in attacks by a group of elephants from the Chandaka Dompara Sanctuary and Wildlife Reserve.

The herd, comprising eight elephants, has travelled around 80 km from the sanctuary and reached Nirakarpur close to Chilika Lake. They attacked the villagers under Lendu gram panchayat on Sunday night, according to forest officials.

The deceased was identified as Bhimsen Chhotray (62), a resident of Aredi village.

In fact, more than 40 out of the total 67 pachyderms in Chandaka were roaming outside the sanctuary area on Monday, Chandaka Divisional Forest Officer Akshaya Kumar Pattnaik said.

The elephants were moving in a vast area spread over three forest divisions such as Chandaka, Khurda and Chilika creating fear among people. By Monday afternoon, the elephants were scattered in locations such as Nirakarpur, Tartua, Jariput and Jaimangal. Besides, some more elephants from the sanctuary were also moving in nearby areas of Dompara and Bharatpur.

The elephants from Chandaka usually come out of the sanctuary in groups during harvesting season in search of food.

But this is for the first time that so many of them had gone out of their habitat.

According to the Khurda DFO G. Rajesh, 20 to 25 elephants were present in Jariput area, while seven pachyderms were in Tartua area.

A tusker that had got separated from the group present in Tartua locality had caused a road accident at Pitapali on Sunday. It had damaged an Indica car.

The officials of the three forest divisions were trying their best to guide the groups of elephants to return to Chandaka.

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