Rogue elephant 'Shankar' turned into kumki, freed from kraal

A rogue elephant, which killed three people in Nilgiris district and two in Kerala last year, was released from kraal (enclosure) on Sunday after successfully turning it into a kumki (tamed elephant).

The 20-year-old Shankar, with a single tusk, had killed the three at Pandalur, about 90 km from here, after destroying farmland in December 2020 and migrated to a forest area near Nilambur in Kerala, where the animal killed two more persons. It returned to Tamil Nadu forests and stayed at Cherampadi, where the Forest Departments of both the States monitored its movement to tranquilise and capture it, but to no avail. At last, Shankar was captured with the help of five kumkis and 100 forest officials on February 12 and taken to Theppakkadu Elephant Camp in Mudumalai Tiger Reserve in the district and kept in the kraal.

The Forest Department tamed it with the help of a mahout for the past 141 days. Later, Shankar mellowed down, a source in the department said.