KOCHI: A captive elephant fled to the forest in Ernakulam district's Bhoothathankettu after being attacked by another captive elephant at a film shoot for a Telugu movie starring Vijay Deverakonda.
The elephant was later located and returned to Vadattupara near Kothamangalam on Saturday.
The elephant 'Puthupally Sadhu' was attacked by another elephant 'Thadathil Manikandan' when the jumbos were being moved into the trucks after the pack-up of the day's shooting at Vadattupara on Friday evening.
A total of five elephants were brought for the film shooting at the site.
Around 4:30 pm Friday, Manikandan attacked Sadhu and the panicked elephant fled to the nearby forest. Even though mahouts and forest officials tried to track the elephant on Friday evening, it could not be found.
The search operation that was stopped at night resumed on Saturday at 6 am. Within an hour, forest officials traced the elephant dung at around one-kilometre distance inside the forest from the shooting location. The mahouts of Sadhu were called for the search operation and the elephant was spotted by around 9:30 am.
Forest officials said Sadhu did not suffer any injuries and responded to mahouts. Food and water were also given to the elephant by its mahout. By around 10.30 am, Sadhu was brought back to the Vadattupara area. Later, he was taken to Puthupally in a truck.
The owner of the elephant Pothen Varghese said Sadhu like its name is a calm elephant.
"Sadhu has been with us for the past 26 years. It never caused any trouble to us. We were confident that Sadhu would be traced easily. The only concern was whether he would be attacked by wild elephants inside the forest. Sadhu is regularly hired for film shootings. We don't see any injury on him. He is calm now," Varghese said.