Cuttack: The elephant, which had sustained multiple gunshot wounds in Odisha’s Cuttack district, succumbed despite the treatment of veterinary doctors on Tuesday.
The 10-year-old tusker was spotted struggling for life in Narasinghpur forest range under Athagarh forest division in Cuttack district on last Tuesday. After Badamba MLA Debi Prasad Mishra drew the attention of Forest minister Pradip Amat about the tusker in his Facebook post, a team of veterinary doctors from Nandankanan Zoo in Bhubaneswar had rushed to the spot for its treatment.
The veterinary doctors had found the elephant being shot at six different places of his body including trunk, face and leg. While undergoing treatment in the forest range, the elephant died, said Ranger Prafulla Dehuri.
At least 133 elephants have been poached or poisoned, 144 electrocuted, 36 mowed down by trains and 6 killed by speeding vehicles on the road in Odisha since April, 2010.
This was revealed by Wildlife Society of Orissa (WSO) and Animal Welfare Trust Ekamra, Odisha during a press conference. The wildlife activists of the two organisations said total 947 elephants have died during the period including 426 due to natural reasons.
They accused the Forest department of attempting to conceal elephant bodies or cover up the cause of an elephant death in numerous cases of late. “Though it is difficult to conceal an elephant death, the Forest department appears to have mastered the art of how to conceal or cover up elephant deaths and mislead public on the actual cause of death,” they said.
They further said the fear of being punished with suspension for dereliction of duties prompt lower level staff not to report an unnatural death as seniors of the division do not offer any support or instill confidence. Barring a few, the veterinary doctors and pathologist, who carry out the post-mortem or test the blood and viscera samples, follow suggestions from the Range Officer or DFO and cite ‘safe’ reasons for elephant deaths thereby covering up the actual cause of death, they added.
WSO has been unsuccessfully pushing Project Elephant and Forest Department for the last 7 years to follow the protocol as followed for tiger deaths as laid down by NTCA. Every tiger death post mortem is video recorded and conducted in presence of at least two independent wildlife experts/conservationist to ensure transparency.
The presence of independent observers during post mortem will prevent such malpractices, they claimed.
