Dhenkanal: In yet another man-elephant conflict, an elderly man was trampled to death by an elephant at Khatuahata village under Pandua police limits in Dhenkanal district Saturday morning.
The deceased has been identified as Kartik Sahu (75).
According to his family members, Kartik had gone outside to attend nature’s call at around 5.30am. Suddenly an elephant came from nowhere and giving little scope to Kartik to act, it caught him in its trunk, flung him onto the ground and trampled him.
On hearing his distress cries, family members and neighbours came to his rescue and rushed Kartik to Dhenkanal district headquarters hospital (DHH). However, he succumbed while undergoing treatment.
Dhenkanal Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) Prakash Chand Gogineni said that the bereaved family will be compensated as per government rules.
With frequent incidents of man-elephant incidents being reported from different parts of the district and the forest department allegedly doing little to end the menace, anger is brewing among the people.
A farmer was crushed to death by an elephant at his farmland at Bereni village under Sadar forest range in Dhenkanal December 7 night.
Chaini Sahoo (60), the deceased farmer was safeguarding his crops on the fateful night. Seeing a herd of elephants entering his farmland, Sahoo tried to drive them away by shouting at them. This provoked one animal which attacked Sahoo, causing his death on the spot.
PNN