A young wild elephant rampaged through the heart of Mysore early on Wednesday, trampling a man to death and injuring four others. Two head of cattle also died in the elephantine fury.
Straying from its herd, the male elephant, aged between 8 and 10, entered the city along with a 12-year-old tusk-less male (a makhna). But it was the tusker which terrorised people as well as cattle in its six-hour rampage.
The makhna, which was separated from the tusker, fortunately did not attack people. Both elephants — believed to be part of a herd from the Cauvery Wildlife Sanctuary, some 40 km from here — ran in different directions: one towards the Sewage Treatment Plant near R.S. Naidu Nagar (Kesare) where it stayed put, and the other towards the Shivarampet-Saraswatipuram areas.
Renukaswamy (55), a security guard at a bank ATM at Shivarampet, was gored to death. The attack was filmed live by journalists and amateurs on mobile phones. The hapless man ran into one of the bylanes of this crowded locality, only to be outrun by the animal. The attack was filmed by journalists and amateurs on mobile phones.
The injured, attacked in other residential localities, are Balakrishna (42), Siddamma (80), Velvet (52) and Pavan (24). While the first three were being treated in the K.R. Hospital, the fourth person was treated as an outpatient and discharged, said Commissioner of Police Sunil Agarwal.
The tusker trashed some vehicles also during its rampage, which began in the Bamboo Bazaar area around 5.15 a.m.
Panic gripped the city, whose most famous festival features resplendently caparisoned elephants, as news of the rampage spread. A live telecast drew curious people who turned up in large numbers to watch something straight from When Animals Attack.
Vehicles not spared
The tusker first attacked a cow tethered to a post on New Sayyaji Rao Road around 6 a.m., and fatally injured another in an adjacent neighbourhood. It then marched towards Mission Hospital Road and attacked octogenarian Siddamma, who was too frail to outpace the agitated jumbo.
“The elephants were first noticed at Bamboo Bazaar around 5.15 a.m. They panicked on seeing the crowds,” Satish Naidu, who tracked the young tusker all along its route, told The Hindu.
Anxious crowds began gathering wherever the tusker went. The police gathered in full strength to contain the surging crowds in and around the Saraswatipuram area, where the animal barged into some scrub near Dhobi Ghat.
Efforts were made to tranquillise the animal on two occasions, the first on the Oval Grounds, which failed. The young bull went on to damage some vehicles, including a KSRTC bus, along the main road and on the JSS Women's College premises.
Another dart was fired near Dhobi Ghat, where hundreds had gathered to see the unfolding drama. Jute ropes and shackles were kept ready before elephants from Mysore Palace took control of the situation. The young animal was finally led away around 11.30 a.m.
The makhna, which stayed put in its refuge, was successfully tranquillised in the afternoon. Four Dasara elephants — Arjuna, Abhimanyu, Gajendra and Srirama — which were brought from the forests, then took over. This was around 5.30 p.m.
Ajay Mishra, Field Director, Project Elephant, told The Hindu that the elephants were corralled now and would be safely released into the forests on Thursday.
As soon as the attack commenced in the area, which has a clutch of schools, the district administration declared a holiday for all educational institutions.
Karnataka Minister for Forests C.H. Vijayashankar, who visited Mr. Renukaswamy's house later, consoled the grieving family and promised a job to one of the members. He handed over a cheque for Rs. 5 lakh as compensation (as a special case) to the family.
The Minister later called on the injured in the hospital, where the condition of Siddamma is said to be serious.
Its my humble request to media to refrain from sensationalizing everything. the other day they ran live show with hundreds watching it. Its worrying that a responsible newspaper to publishes a photo of a man being tramped. kindly apologize to the victim's family.
The news of elephants straying into the Mysore city entails our state governments to equip forest departments with adequate tool-kits including tranquilizers, medicines etc to capture wicked animals. Trained veterinarians and traditionally skilled personnel in handling animals must be available in each hub close to the forest area which is prone to attack by animals. The Mysore incident must awake all state governments while animals come out of jungle in search of water and food. Mass cutting of trees, land grabbing and deforestation for industrialization etc had reduced space for animals despite certain species are becoming extinct. There is scarceness of bamboo in hill valleys, its favorite munch and lack of water in streams during summer. Despite adverse situations for habitation, the elephant population had grown unusually. There was inordinate delay in capturing elephants which roamed the city violently rampaging and killing two persons. The Forest administration was ill-equipped and unorganized to handle an emergency situation. It also failed to control the mob of people who made elephants furious and react ferociously on anything or anyone seen in front of it! Mysore forests have highest number of Asian Elephants. Both Kerala and Tamil Nadu must learn the lesson from the Mysore incident. Both states have to upgrade forest departments on a war footing at vulnerable towns and villages where there are threats of vandalism by animals from nearby forest areas. Please take care of towns like Palani, Udumalaipet, Valparai, Pollachi, Kollengode, Chulliar Dam, Nelliyampathy, Pothundy (Nenmara), Peechi (Pattikkad), Mangalam Dam (Vandazhi), Chalakkudi, Mannarkkad, Nilambur, Manathavadi etc.
This is a very sad story. To see a poor innocent elephant displaced from his herd - as a result of panic and anxiety due to people chasing them - and then going on creating the rampage in the city. Very sad. I agree with the previous comment that any news media should not publish such disturbing images. Why did it took so long to tranqulize this poor animal. Also the images of the elephant being dragged to the forest are disturbing - there should be and are better ways to handle stray animals.
Realy sad incident...this is a effect of modernization.
The elephants, cows ,monkeys and other animals and trees , flowers are all nature's gift to humanity. It is up to us how to handle these gifts. Sometimes people handle these gifts in the wrong way without realizing the consequences. Poaching and killing the intelligent elephants for the valuable ivory are evil things. Did you know that during the Tsunami , all the elephants in various parts went to the higher ground . They felt and sensed the danger coming to them. It is the same way when many thousands of people are surrounding these mammals, they feel intimidated and started fighting the enemies. I have seen so many tamed elephants in Thailand ,Laos and India . In Thailand people worship elephants in the form of Hindu God Ganesha whose image is in almost all the Buddhist temples.And the largest statue of Ganesha in the world is in Thailand.
With deforestation happening rapidly in the name of development, such man-animal encounters are bound to occur. This is only going to increase. This goes to show, we need to preserve whatever forest area we have and learn to manage development without destroying environment.
If the people had not crowded, followed and heckled the elephant, it might have become a bit calm and settled down somewhere.
Our people are gathering in numbers and simply watching the strange things. I don't know whether they have not seen any elephant before. Even man will get agitated when a group of people looked at him and what will that poor elephant do. Its better to stay away from wild animals and do ur work. My deep condolance to that family who lost their man and wishing speedy recovery for those got hospitilaised.
The Hindu should refrain to put such disturbinh snap.
I think it is not good on your part to show a picture of a person being killed. It is really unfortunate that this happened. The least you all can do for that person's family is to remove these pictures of him being killed from your web page.
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