A 35-year-old man lost his life after being trampled by a wild elephant in Chhattisgarh’s Balrampur district on Thursday, marking the fourth fatality in similar incidents over the past four days, officials said.
The tragic incident took place in Ghaghra village, within the limits of Pasta police station, when the victim, identified as Mahendra Gond, along with three other villagers, went to check on their crops in the fields. While the others managed to escape upon noticing the elephant, Mahendra was caught by the animal’s trunk and was trampled to death.
Upon receiving the information, forest and police personnel arrived at the scene and sent the body for post-mortem examination.
Authorities provided Mahendra’s family, who reside in Kochli village, with an immediate relief amount of ₹25,000, while the remaining compensation of ₹5.75 lakh will be disbursed after the completion of the necessary formalities, forest officials stated.
The latest attack follows a string of similar incidents in the region. On Monday, two people lost their lives and another was injured in separate elephant attacks in the Ramanujganj area of Balrampur district, while on Wednesday, a woman was killed in another elephant attack in Shankargarh.
The presence of two wild tuskers, which have strayed into Balrampur from neighboring Jharkhand, has led to widespread panic among villagers. Forest department teams have been closely monitoring the movement of these elephants and issuing alerts to locals to prevent further casualties.
Human-elephant conflicts have been a significant concern in Chhattisgarh over the past decade, particularly in the northern districts. However, such incidents have increasingly been reported in the central regions in recent years.
The most-affected districts include Surguja, Raigarh, Korba, Surajpur, Mahasamund, Dhamtari, Gariaband, Balod, Balrampur, and Kanker.
According to forest officials, approximately 320 people have lost their lives in elephant attacks across the state in the last five years, underscoring the growing threat posed by the human-wildlife conflict.
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