Two elephants, one of them a calf, raided the police station compound at the Parambikulam Tiger Reserve on Wednesday night and spread fear among the policemen on duty at the station.
The female elephant and her calf entered the compound around 10.30 p.m. and started banging the doors. They then stood in front of the iron grill fixed at the station’s portico and banged it heavily, damaging it.
The presence of elephants, alone and in herds, is common across the reserve. According to forest officers, the elephants rarely charge at the people in the reserve. However, they wondered how the incident happened and what turned the mother elephant angry. The elephants withdrew after half-an-hour.
Viral video
A video shot by one of the police personnel from inside went viral on social media.
“Rarely do we report a man-elephant confrontation in the Parambikulam Tiger Reserve. Any trauma we cause to the wild animals, especially the elephant, will reflect in their behaviour,” said Saby Varghese, Wildlife Technical Assistant in Palakkad.
A media team from Palakkad had come across several elephants at Parambikulam during a visit last week, but none of them showed any hostile behaviour. “Elephants in Parambikulam ignore people in general. That’s why we always advise the tourists not to cause them even the slightest anguish. Any trauma caused to them may remain in their mind and reflect in their behaviour later,” said Murugesan, a forest guide.
