KOLKATA: The elephant is a quiet animal, but the one that has separated from its herd can be moody, and a killer. That’s what a selfie group in West Bengal’s West Midnapore realized on Friday when it came close to the tusker for that ‘rare’ picture. A group member, described as a man in his 50s, went a step ahead and tried to touch the animal’s tail.
The furious jumbo turned around and trampled Madhab Malla to death, said a forest department official. Sources said the elephant was roaming the area for weeks, prompting locals to name it ‘Ramlal.’ Manish Yadav, the divisional forest officer of the Rupnarayan division, said the elephant had never turned violent before. “Since it got separated from the herd, the full-grown elephant started entering localities frequently. After eating vegetables, sometimes offered by villagers, the elephant returned to forests. Though local residents followed the animal, it never attacked humans,’’ he said.
The elephant came out of a nearby forest and entered Dudhpathri village in the Goaltorh area on Friday. “A group of about 20 villagers surrounded the tusker. They started nagging the animal by pulling its tail and pelting it with stones. As the elephant turned to the nearby forest, the villagers with cell phones, started taking selfies. They went too close,’’ said Yadav.
For Malla and several like him, the funniest moment was slipping away. Malla first attempted to take a selfie standing close to the tusker’s trunk. “But he could not manage himself. He then went behind the elephant and touched its tail. As he posed for a selfie, the elephant turned around. Malla did not get a chance to run away. The animal grabbed him using its trunk and trampled him to death,’’ said Yadav.
Forest officials said it appears the elephant turned violent due to flashlights of mobile cameras. “The camera flash annoys animals. Before Puja, we campaigned in the areas close to elephant corridors not to take photos of elephants. We specifically told villagers not to use flashlights of their mobile cameras,’’ said an official.