10-member team from Bengal roped in to drive away wild elephants from Singhbhum

Jamshedpur: Concerned over rising cases of tusker menace in rural areas of Singhbhum, the forest department has roped in a team of professional elephant chasers from Bengal.
A 10-member team from Bankura district in Bengal has reached Seraikela for driving away a herd of wild elephants which is damaging crops and mud-thatched houses.
The forest department has hired the team at a rate of Rs 500 per member per day beside free-lodging and fooding. The team headed by Banmali Mahto started their operation for driving the wild elephants away to Keonjhar jungle in neighbouring Odisha from on Sunday afternoon.
The guest trainers will also coach villagers on methods to drive away marauding wild elephants back to the jungle from the paddy fields. The visiting team would however not train the villagers. �The team is here for a specific job to chase away the elephants back to the jungle while the training to the village youths will be given by their master sometime later,� said an official.
�The department is also looking for young men between 18 to 25 years of age group for the training purpose and preference would be on those villages which are adjacent to the Dalma forest hill,� said a middle rung forest official in the division.
People are in state of havoc due to such menace. Sometimes villagers migrate to safer places for a week or more to avoid the sudden night-time attacks of the wild elephant herds.
�We are forced to spend sleepless nights. Our lives are at risk due to rampaging elephants. Elephants regularly venture into villages, destroy houses, damage standing crops and even trample people to death. We are forced to work like a �night guard� to save our lives and crops� said a villager.
The herd has entered into Seraikela jungle in November end and ever since it is moving around from one jungle to another beside straying into human habitats for eating paddy crops and harvested paddy every night.
A forest official said during the stay of the herd, the elephants have damaged more than 120 houses and damaged standing crops over 100 hectors of land beside eating up the harvested crops. One of the elephants in the herd has also killed a 24-year-old man at Sinni in Seraikela on January 9, leading the forest department to pay Rs 4 lakh compensation to the victim’s family.
Revealing about the operation, Seraikela divisional forest officer, A Ekka said that the team has started studying the elephant corridor in Seraikela today.