Elephant herd sighted at Bannerghatta

BANGALORE: A herd of 20 to 25 elephants were found camping near Bhutanahalli in Bannerghatta National Park on Sunday.R Gokul, Divisional Forest Officer (DFO) of Bannerghatta National Park, told Express, “Usually the elephants come to that point to drink the effluents released from a nearby distillery since they are addicted to it for the last so many years. They will return to forests on Sunday night or in the early hours of Monday without causing any damage to standing crops.”The herd was seen by a group of visitors near Bhutanahalli on Sunday afternoon. They alerted the forest officials immediately. The Forest Department staff are at the spot trying to drive back the elephants into forests. If they resist, the staff will send them back on Monday night.The DFO said some elephants are addicted to the effluents released from the distillery as they get a ‘kick’. If the elephants are in group, they will go back into forests without harming anybody. “But the damage is certain if a tusker ‘thrown out’ from its herd enters the village. Their present location is just near the Khoday’s distilleries, Tataguni Estate and hardly a few kilometres away from Savandurga. A few years ago there used to be around 70 ‘resident’ elephants in the Bannerghatta National Park but their number has dwindled now. Even the number of crop damage cases has come down from 740 to 88, thanks to the consistent awareness campaigns being conducted by the department. Soon the harvesting will be over, farmers in the region have been asked to remove the harvested crop as it attract the pachyderms,” he said. Gokul said the elephants come from Tamil Nadu and they get clogged in Bannerghatta since it is a narrow passage and the end of the traditional elephant route. Whenever the department staff observe  the pachyderms in the vicinity, they are driven back to the forests. There are some huts belonging to Hakki-Pikki tribals and the elephants pass through the human habitation without harming anybody generally. “I have asked my staffers to be alert till the elephants go back into forests. As of now, these elephants are calm and quiet. They may have come here for a Sunday party,” the DFO remarked jokingly.