Elephant found dead roadside

Bhanjanagar: Saturday night in the Tarasingh forest range of the Ghumusar North Forest division in Ganjam District a female elephant was found dead in a roadside forest near Narayanprasad under the Tarasingh forest range of the Ghumusar North forest division in Ganjam, a female elephant was found dead.

Prompted by the incident the Forest personnels reached the spot early morning and launched an investigation. The elephant was estimated to be around five years old.

After a Joint Task Force (JTF) team arrived from Bhubaneswar, a post-mortem was conducted in the presence of wildlife experts along with the representatives of the voluntary organisation SNEHA, officials from Tata Power, and local  the panchayat representatives.

Officials suspect that the elephant could have been dead for around four to five days prior to its spotting. Divisional Forest Officer, Himanshu Sekhar Mohanty said that the exact cause of death will be known after the post-mortem report is received.

Samples from various parts of the elephant’s body have been dispatched to OUAT in Bhubaneswar for further analysis.

The remaining sections of the carcass were interred at the location. JTF SP Batakrushna Mishra, DFO Mohanty, ACFs Bibek Das, Bimal Prasad Pradhan, Mujagada forest ranger Bimbadhar Sahu, Tarasingh forest ranger Prashant Kumar Behera, wildlife enthusiast Ramesh Kumar Patra, SNEHA member Prashant Rout, and a Tata Power SDO were present during this process. The RCCF of Berhampur also visited the Tarasingh forest range and engaged in discussions with local departmental officials at the nearest Dak Bungalow concerning the elephant’s demise.