A 72-year-old farmer was killed by a wild elephant at his farm land located 2 km from a reserve forest area in Talavadi range here on Wednesday.
Mallanayakar owns land at Dharmapuram village in where he cultivates banana. On Tuesday night, he went to the farm to guard his crop. Since he did not return home in the morning, his family members went to the field and found him lying there. Preliminary inquiries by the Forest Department reveal that the elephant entered the field and started to damage the crops. When he tried to drive away the animal, it attacked him. Mallanayakar died on the spot.
As the news spread, villagers wanted the forest officials to take effective steps to prevent wild animals from entering farm lands. They also said that elephant-proof-trenches were not maintained properly. Because of this, the elephants frequently invaded their crops. They said loss of human lives and damage to crops continued in the hill area.
They wanted Devendra Kumar Meena, District Forest Officer, Hasanur division, and Deputy Field Director of Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve to come to the spot and hold talks with them. They said loss of human lives and damage to crops continued in the hill area and refused to allow the body to be shifted to the hospital.
Later, Devendra Kumar Meena, District Forest Officer, Hasanur division, and Deputy Field Director of Sathyamangalam Tiger Reserve arrived at the spot and held talks with the protestors.
He said that work to dig a trench and erect a fence for 3.7 km would commence from Thursday. He also handed over interim relief of ₹1 lakh to the victim’s son and assured that the balance amount of ₹4 lakh would be provided within a week. In addition to this, ₹2.5 lakh from the DFO’s fund would be provided.
After the talks, the body was shifted to the Government Hospital at Sathyamangalam for a postmortem. The victim is survived by his wife, a son and a daughter.
