Dibrugarh, July 12: A carcass of male elephant was found dead at Sema pathar in Margherita’s Tinsukia district on Friday morning.

It has been suspected that the elephant died due to electrocution.

Electrocution of elephants has now emerged as one of the largest threats to the surviving population of wild elephants in Assam. According to data available with the state forest department and NGOs, out of the 212 elephant deaths reported since 2017, 52 died due to electrocution.

“We found a big male elephant was lying dead near a bamboo tree at Sema pathar. We suspected that the elephant died due to electrocution. This was not the first time, similar incidents was happened earlier but the forest department has not taken any step to nabbed the culprit,” said a villager of Makum Pathar.

He said a few days ago the elephant had damaged some houses in the area. “We suspected that the elephant was electrocuted” he added.

Meanwhile, the forest department reached the spot and collected the samples of the dead elephant for autopsy.

“The elephant movements are badly affected due to the blocking of the Bogapani and Golai elephant corridor. The elephant entered in human settlement area without finding no alternative and resulting in man-elephant conflict. Most of the reserve forest were flooded due to the recent wave of flood,” said Debojit Moran, an environmentalist.

He said, “Due to the illegal open cast mining in most of the reserve forest in Tinsukia, the elephant movements were affected and they could not find out their route and most of the times they entered in human habitation in search of food,”.

“The open cast mining in most of the reserve forests of Tinsukia district has badly affected the elephant movements. Its a high time, the district administration should take immediate steps to stop the illegal open cast mining which has been adversely impacting the biodiversity of the region,” said Moran.

An adult wild elephant died after being hit by a speeding train in Assam’s Morigaon district on Wednesday.

According to the eyewitnesses, the tusker sustained grievous injuries after being hit by the train and it tried to walk but fell near the tracks and breathed its last in a few minutes.

India has nearly 30,000 wild elephants. More than 490 wild elephants died due to unnatural causes in the last five years. Electrocution and collisions with trains were the main causes of these fatalities.

Also Read: Assam: Three dead, Two missing after boat capsizes in Goalpara

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