Elephant menace worries villagers

JORHAT, Feb 7: The wild elephants from Gibbon Wildlife Sanctuary have created havoc in the adjoining areas for the last four days, destroying about 14 huts in tea garden labour line and also damaging the bungalow of the manager of Murmuriya Tea Estate.
The Forest Department sources said that the elephants had been moving around Murmuriya, Sarupathar and Katonibari area at night. A huge tusker broke into the houses of Lilawati, Lakhimani and Bijit and ate up all the foodgrain stocks. It later broke into the kitchen of the manager of Murmuriya Tea Estate and damaged the ceiling and a wall. A Forest Department source said that recently two elephants broke a number of houses in the adjoining villages. The District Forest Officer had visited the areas to assess the damage.
The source said that the 21 sq km Gibbon Wildlife Sanctuary was too small to hold the herd numbering more than 25 elephants. "At present only about 2 or 3 elephants can survive in such a small habitat and if 25 elephants inhabit the area, they would obviously have to forage for food outside the forest," the source added. "Moreover, elephants are drawn to the smell of hooch brewed illegally being made in the villages and prefer the taste of something different," the sources further said.
The mushrooming of small tea gardens with protective fencing also hampers the wild elephants from wending their way up to the Naga Hills and are contained within a limited space, thus forcing them to search for food within that area.
Recently, the Forest Department paid more than Rs 11 lakh as compensation to villagers who had been the victims of elephant depredations, but the villagers are fed up with living with the constant fear of being attacked by these pachyderms and crave for a permanent solution to the problem.