Human elephant conflict rises in India

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Fighting for their territory

 

Rajesh Sinha

Monday, November 20, 2006 21:50 IST

 

 

 

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NEW DELHI: Not just life's pressures, social stress and even a sort of road

rage is afflicting wild elephants in India. And this is a direct consequence

of growing human presence, climate change and dwindling habitat and food and

water that is increasingly bringing them up against humans.

 

Nearly 300 persons are killed every year by wild elephants in India. The

figure was as low as 200 till year 1999-2000 - an indicator of the growing

human-elephant conflict.

 

Where for centuries humans and elephants lived in relatively peaceful

co-existence, there is now hostility and violence. It was usually attributed

to high testosterone levels in male elephants in 'musth' during mating

season or to the competition for land and resources between elephants and

humans. In 'Elephant Breakdown,' an essay in the journal 'Nature', Gay

Bradshaw and her colleagues argued that today's elephant populations are

suffering from a form of chronic stress, a kind of species-wide trauma.

Decades of killings and habitat loss, they claim, have disrupted the

intricate web of familial and societal relations in the herds and affected

the milieu in which young elephants have been raised in the wild.

 

This is a phenomenon witnessed all across Africa, India and parts of

Southeast Asia. Shrinking and fragmentation of their habitat, disruption of

natural corridors they use to migrate from one area to another, dwindling

food and water forcing them to move out to look for sustenance of the herd

and humans encroaching into their areas bring them into unwanted contact and

conflict with people.

 

Elephants have a matriarchal society and the female is extremely protective

and possessive about the calves. She does not like any disturbance to the

herd. Any perception of danger triggers a violent reaction from the herd.

And requirement for its sustenance drives the herd to what seems 'drastic'

action to villagers - breaking into huts where harvested crop is stored,

plundering the fields and, if disturbed, turning violent.

 

Male elephants turning into adults and thrown out of the herd - " to prevent

inbreeding " , explained an officer - are also troublesome. Left alone,

unwanted by the herd they grew up with, they are temperamental and short

tempered. While greater forest cover earlier kept them away from contact

with humans, they now frequently come face to face with each other.

 

With their habitats under pressure, elephant herds have moved into areas

they have not been seen in for decades. According to AN Prasad, Director,

Project Elephant, elephants have phenomenally long memories and in many

parts of the country, facing shortage of food and water, they have started

exploring and going back to areas they had abandoned earlier. They are seen

once again in Tirupati. For the last decade or so, they have been found in

Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. And, when Bellary region started turning

dry, they forayed into neighbouring, water-rich Maharashtra.

 

If a herd on the move encounters obstacles from human settlements, the two

react according to their earlier experience — or lack of it. Unsavoury

encounters can provoke attacks. " Even in cities there are incidents of

people shooting at others due to 'road rage', " said PR Sinha, Director of

Wildlife Institute of India.

 

In India, elephant habitats have fragmented into 88 patches in the country,

said Sinha, and this is increasing under pressure of human population. This

often throws man and animal in confrontational situations. " It is not

accidental; it is imminent, " said Sinha.