The Kerala Forest Department has propelled a ‘manhunt’ for those answerable for the passing of a 15-year-old pregnant wild elephant, said an authority. The elephant had kicked the bucket subsequent to being truly harmed by sparklers covered up in a pineapple.

Addressing IANS Samuel Pachuau, the Wildlife Warden of the Silent Valley National Park, close here said this was genuine wrongdoing whosoever was behind it.

It was on the 23rd of a month ago we came to think about this occurrence when the elephant was spotted almost a water source outside the National park,” said Pachuau.

According to him, some people had placed firecrackers inside a pineapple and this was eaten by the wild elephant, and in the process of chewing the cracker burst and injured the elephant.

“We summoned a veterinarian and later on the 25th an elephant expert David Abraham came and examined and explained to us the bad situation,” said Pachuau.

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KEY HIGHLIGHTS

The elephant was in immense pain for 2-3 weeks after she ate a pineapple which was stuffed with firecrackers by some locals in Kerala’s Palakkad district. She died last week, standing in a river, after going through unthinkable trauma.

The horrific incident became known to the larger public after it was shared on social media by a forest officer
“We informed the Forest officials that the prognosis was bad and two days later the elephant died in a sitting posture in the water.

The next day, when we conducted the post-mortem we found a nearly two-month-old fetus. From the uterus, we could make out it was the first pregnancy of the elephant.

Only when we conducted the autopsy, we could see that the upper and lower jaw, teeth, and tongue of the elephant were badly damaged. The cause of death is due to the aspiration of the lungs as it was filled with water. It was a sad day for many of us,” said Abraham.

Soon after the autopsy was conducted, the dead elephant has buried in the forest.“Two sets of teams are probing this incident,” added Pachuau.

Even though there have been reports of man-animal conflict in the forest areas, where wild animals destroy crops of farmers, this episode has left many deeply saddened.