A mother and her young daughter have been killed in an attack by wild elephants that entered a settlement in Ramu, Cox's Bazar. The incident happened at about 5.30am on Thursday (30 April) in a colony in West Khuniapalong in Khuniapalong union of the upazila.

The dead are Chemon Ara Begum, 27, wife of Md Ekram, a Rohingya of West Khuniapalong, and her two-and-a-half-year-old daughter Asma Akter. The family had reportedly built a house on forest department land and had lived there for several years.

Local madrasa teacher Jubairul Islam said Ekram Mia and his wife came out of the house on hearing people shouting, with their two children. Seeing the danger, Ekram Mia managed to get away quickly with their six-year-old son Rehan Uddin, but Chemon Ara and their young daughter were caught by the elephants and killed on the spot.

Local residents said a herd of wild elephants suddenly entered the settlement around dawn. The elephants broke the boundary walls of several homes and uprooted trees nearby, and panic spread through the area at once.

Joynal Abedin, a member of the Khuniapalong union parishad, said there were three elephants in the herd and they behaved very aggressively. Because the mother and daughter came face to face with them suddenly, they had no chance to escape. The elephants then damaged houses, ate fruit from nearby trees and went off into the neighbouring hills.

Abdul Haque, chairman of the Khuniapalong union parishad (UP), said panic spread when the herd suddenly entered the settlement and began wrecking houses, and the mother and daughter were killed on the spot in the attack.

Md Tosaddek Hossain, officer of the Dhoapalong range of the Cox's Bazar South Forest Division, said the herd was driven into the deep forest immediately after the incident, and necessary steps are being taken to control the movement of wild elephants.

Monirul Islam Bhuiyan, officer in charge (OC) of Ramu police station, said police were sent to the scene on news of the deaths. After an inquest report was prepared, it was decided at the family's wish to bury the bodies.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.