JOIN USA herd of seven elephants camping at Addahalla in Maruru Kaval village under the Kattamalalvadi Panchayat limits was cause for anxiety in the residents of the taluk on Monday.
The herd is said to have strayed from the forests under the Nagarhole National Park via Muthurayanahosahalli on Sunday night towards the town and was spotted at Maruru Kaval on Monday morning.
As elephant footprints were found at Madapura, the herd is suspected to have strayed from Kallabetta forest area. The pachyderms were found cooling themselves in the flowing stream at Addahalla near a coconut farm owned by Basavaraju. The herd comprises two tuskers, three female elephants and two calves.
Praveen Raj Urs of the village spotted the jumbos in the water at 9 am on Monday on his way to his farm.
He immediately informed the locals and the Forest department. Speaking to Deccan Herald, Basavaraju said he heard dogs barking in his farm around 11 pm on Sunday. He also noticed a herd of elephants passing towards Addahalla and alerted the people nearby.
ACF Sripathy and ACF Prasannakumar (Hunsur division) visited the spot with their teams.
Around 60 people have taken part in the operation to chase the elephants, including a 20-member police team.
Jumbos Bheema, Abhimanyu, Srinivas and Krishna from Mathigodu and Kallahalli elephant camps have been brought to the village to drive the elephants back into the forest.
The operation started after dusk and the Forest personnel are confident of chasing them from the town during the night.
It was again the general public, who had gathered in large numbers, that created trouble for the Forest personnel in executing the operation. The staff had to struggle to control the crowd from entering the coconut farm.
DH News Service