MADURAI: The Madurai Bench of the Madras High Court on Tuesday dismissed a Public Interest Litigation (PIL) filed by a Kerala resident seeking direction to the TN government to form an expert team to monitor the movement of wild elephant Arikomban and ensure that it goes into deep forest without entering agricultural lands. A Bench of justices SM Subramaniam and V Lakshminarayanan said the authorities and expert team are taking necessary steps to handle the matter and the court cannot interfere in the matter.
In his PIL, N Praveen Kumar from Kannur district of Kerala, said the jumbo was already tranquilised twice for its capture in April and June this year. Due to this, it has become skinny and its body cannot take any more doses of tranquilisers, he claimed.
He requested the court to forbear the TN forest officials from using any tranquilisers on the elephant while preventing its entry into agricultural lands. Kumar further sought a direction to the authorities to use 'satellite radio collar' to monitor the elephant's movement by forming an expert team including 'Adivasi' people and help the elephant go deep into the forest. Since the government counsel contended that the forest authorities and expert team were already taking sufficient measures, the judges dismissed the plea.