A herd of wild elephants that strayed into various human habitats at Punjavayal, Mararkadavu and Puthanangadi, near Panamaram, in Wayanad district on Saturday morning triggered panic among local people.
Forest Department sources said a herd of four tuskers entered a village at Punjavayal around 2 km from the Neykuppa section of forest under the South Wayanad forest division.
The herd was sighted inside a private coffee plantation in the area around 5.30 a.m. A team of forest officials led by Chethalayath forest range officer T. Sasikumar reached the spot.
No damage to property
When the animals entered some thickly populated areas, it raised anxiety among people. Later they entered the adjoining villages of Marakadavu and Punjavayal. But no destruction of property was reported. The elephants did not try to attack anybody, though they crossed two major roads.
After six hours of chase, the team managed to send the elephants into the Pathiri reserve forest. Thirty front-line forest staff members took part in the operation, supervised by South Wayanad Forest Divisional Officer B. Ranjith Kumar.
Villagers in tenterhooks
The straying elephants had been triggering panic in the Punjavayal and Ammani areas for the past two weeks, said villagers.
The recurring incidents caused huge crop loss for farmers, they added. A huge granite lamp installed on the premises of a Ganesha temple at Punjavayal was destroyed last week in an elephant attack, they said.
