Gudalur relieved as wild elephant ‘Bullet’ finally in capture after months of rampage

COIMBATORE: Villagers in Gudalur heaved a sigh of relief as a wild elephant nicknamed ‘Bullet’ was finally captured on Friday. It will be translocated to the Nilgiris soon.

“The elephant was administered two shots of sedatives at 4.55 pm and another at 5.38 pm with a tranquilliser gun. It will be translocated and not held captive,” said N Venkatesh Prabhu, Divisional Forest Officer (Gudalur).

The wild elephant had been making headlines for rampaging houses even as all the measures by the forest department to discourage its intrusions into human settlements turned futile. Friday’s operation involved more than 75 forest department personnel who had deployed drones to track its movement.

The sedated elephant was goaded into a truck with the help of two kumkis -- Srinivasan and Vijay -- from Theppakadu elephant camp in Mudumalai. The elephant is likely to be relocated to Mudumalai.

Also Read: WATCH | Wild elephant ‘Bullet’ continues to play truant: Hears drone, runs into forest in the Nilgiris

Villagers in Cherambadi and Pandalur have been spending sleepless nights as Bullet damaged over 40 houses in the past ten days alone. All these days, besides deploying two kumkis, the forest department personnel also created smoke of dried elephant dung, sprayed dung of ‘musth’ elephant around houses, and hung clothes smeared in a paste of natural repellant like chilli powder and neem oil to scare away the elephant.

It still damaged two houses in Gudalur Forest Division on Wednesday night, forcing estate workers to boycott work and resort to another round of protest on Thursday.