A baby elephant was electrocuted to death at an agriculture field on the outskirts of Palamaner, 50 km from Chittoor in Andhra Pradesh, after it had strayed from the Koundinya Wildlife Sanctuary early on July 21.
According to the Divisional Forest Officer (Chittoor-West) Sunil Kumar Reddy, the elephant, aged 1-2 years, and its mother had left the sanctuary around midnight on July 20. A few hours later, they reached the outskirts of the town.
After the baby came into contact with an uninsulated cable at a transformer, the mother kept trumpeting and circling round the transformer. It later retreated into the nearby thickets as the movement of people increased after dawn.
The DFO along with senior forest officials from Palamaner, Punganur and Madanapalle rushed to the spot. A team of veterinary experts have left the SV Zoo Park in Tirupati for Palamaner to conduct a post-mortem.
It is the third elephant to die in a span of two months in the Koundinya sanctuary belt.
