A 35-year-old female elephant died of electrocution in Dhelwatand village of Khalari block on Saturday morning after coming in contact with a high-tension wire placed by villagers at a farm field to generate power for watering the field, forest officials said.
While villagers have pleaded innocence terming the death of the tusker as an accident, forest officials have initiated a probe into the matter to see if the wire was deliberately placed in the field to harm elephants.
“The possibility of villagers deliberately placing the wire in the field to harm elephants cannot be denied. However, prima facie, it seems that the wire was placed in the field to supply power to machines used for irrigation,” said District Forest Officer (DFO), Ranchi, Ashok Kumar Dubey.
