Farmers in several villages in the South Rangunia police station area are suffering from wild elephant attacks. On Friday, 1 July, Ananta Chowdhury, an orchard owner and retired teacher in Sarafbhata union of Rangunia upazila, filed a general diary (GD) against wild elephants for destroying his mango orchard.

Within 24 hours, a farmer named Abdul Aziz (65) was killed by a wild elephant in Tripura Sundari village of neighbouring Padua union. The death happened on the night of Friday, 1 July, and police recovered the body from the scene on 2 July.

Abdul Aziz was the son of the late Gunu Mia of the area. South Rangunia police station OC Md Obaidullah said Abdul Aziz, a resident of Tripura Sundari village in Padua union, grew vegetables on land he sharecropped from different people. He was attacked by a wild elephant while guarding his vegetable field at night and died on the spot.

The OC said local orchard owner Ananta Chowdhury had filed the general diary at the police station on Friday morning over the destruction of his mango orchard in the Sarafbhata area.

In the GD he said herds of elephants had been coming down from the hills at night for two days, uprooting trees and eating up the mangoes. He claimed the wild elephants had caused Tk 2.5 lakh worth of damage to mangoes and trees.

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