COIMBATORE: Chief Wildlife Warden Rakesh Kumar Dogra, during a recent hearing related to a wild elephant that was found dead at the Boluvampatti block II reserve forest of Poondi south forest beat on October 10, told the Madras High Court there was no unnatural cause.
He submitted a report after a Chennai-based activist petitioned the high court, raising suspicion that the dead elephant was the same animal that entered Vellingiri Andavar Thirukovil at Poondi on October 2 and videos of which were widely circulated.
"The postmortem findings revealed that the animal may have died 10-14 days prior. The carcass would be just eight days old if it was of the same elephant that entered Poondi temple on October 2. Moreover, there were no electric lines or wires around the place where the carcass was found. There was no sign of poaching as the tusks remained intact. There were no external injuries, and the postmortem revealed no fracture. No suspicious foreign materials or unusual odours were detected," the report, a copy of which is available with the TNIE, stated.
"The carcass was highly decomposed and unsuitable for detailed postmortem, due to which no samples were collected for forensic analysis. Therefore, without giving room for any speculations, the alleged unnatural cause of death can be completely ruled out," the report stated
The report also stated that a total of 232 wild elephants died due to various factors in seven forest ranges of Coimbatore Forest Division between 2010 and 2025
"The lowest elephant deaths (eight) was reported in 2024 and the highest (23) in 2023. Of the 232 elephant deaths reported till November 7, 30 were due to unnatural causes, while 202 numbers were due to natural causes. 13 elephant deaths have been reported in Coimbatore division so far this year, of which 10 were due to natural causes," the report stated.