A preparatory meeting was held under the chairmanship of district Collector B Parameswaran to chalk out plans to combat menace of migratory elephants.Besides DFO Harshabardhan Udgata, other staffs of forest and police departments and DRDA PD Mohan Charan Das were present at the meeting.
A herd of Jharkhand-originated elephants have arrived in Mayurbhanj and it is expected to enter into Baleswar district in a couple of days and stay in for a period of at least three weeks. As in previous years, they are expected to sneak into the Nilgiri, Kuldiha, Ayodhya, Tinikoshia and Oupada forests. Since each year during the elephants’ seasonal migration they cause of large-scale damages to household property and agriculture, the meeting decided to form six patrolling teams to keep a watch on them.
The first priority would be to keep crowds of people off from the herd. It was decided that the Forest Department would erect temporary check-posts at Sajnagarh, Telipal, Ayodhya, Matiali and Berhampur and public movement would be restricted in these area between 4 pm and 7 am. The locals desiring to move out would be lodged in six nearby schools. To prevent electrocution of jumbos, power supply would be cut in the concerned areas for a required period.
last year, the migratory elephants during their 18-day stay damaged nearly 160 dwelling houses, including 66 fully damaged, destroyed agriculture in about 570 hectares of land. A sum of about Ra 72 lakh was paid towards compensation to the affected people.