Drunken elephants kill 3

2006-11-14 17:05

Guwahati - Drunken elephants in India's northeast trampled three people to death, including a four year-old boy, and critically injured his eight-year-old brother, officials said on Tuesday.

The herd trampled the victims, who were all from the same family, on Monday after guzzling rice beer in Teok Kathoni, a tribal village 370km east of Assam's main city Guwahati.

Villagers tried to chase away the elephants by beating drums and bursting firecrackers, but they "tore apart a hut with the family inside", village elder Dhiren Gadak said by phone.

The elephants, confronted by shrinking forest cover and human encroachment on their turf, have increasingly strayed into villages, searching for food and attacking people.

During the past fortnight, elephants have been wreaking havoc in Assam, especially in villages where tribal people brew rice beer.

"We've reports of several incidents of elephants going berserk looking for rice beer, plundering granaries and tearing apart huts, and killing human beings," said elephant specialist Kushal Konwar Sharma.

Elephants killed 239 people in Assam in the past five years, while 265 elephants have died during the same period, many poisoned by angry humans, according to official figures.

Assam has India's biggest Asiatic elephant population, estimated at 5 300, according to a recently released wildlife census.

- AFP