In Odisha’s Mayurbhanj district, an unusual incident of man-animal conflict has come to the fore. On June 10, a 60-year-old woman named Maya Murmu from the Raipal village in Mayurbhanj’s Rasagobindapur area was attacked and trampled by an elephant in the forest near her village.
As per reports, the woman was taken to the hospital in critical condition where she was declared dead. The woman’s family and neighbours had waited till the medical formalities and post-mortem examination were done and had brought the woman’s dead body back to the village in the evening for her last rites.
While the villagers were preparing for the woman’s last rites, the elephant that had reportedly attacked the woman several hours earlier came back aggressively. While the villagers ran to save their lives, the tusker then reportedly started attacking the dead woman’s corpse. The furious pachyderm went on trampling the woman’s body.
#ଦନ୍ତାର_ଦାଦାଗିରି#ସକାଳେ_ମାରିଲା, #ସଞ୍ଜରେ_ଦଳିଦେଲା
— Kanak News (@kanak_news) June 11, 2022
ଶବକୁ ଛାଡିଲାନି ଦନ୍ତାହାତୀ । ସକାଳେ ବୃଦ୍ଧାଙ୍କୁ କଚାଡି ମାରିଥିଲା, ସଞ୍ଜରେ ପୁଣି ଫେରି ଦଳିଚକଟି ଦେଲା । ଚର୍ଚ୍ଚା ସୃଷ୍ଟିକଲା ହିଂସ୍ର ହୋଇପଡିଥିବା ଦନ୍ତା ହାତୀର ସ୍ୱଭାବ । #Elephant #Mayurbhanj pic.twitter.com/jT8BMN7FaJ
Odia media have reported that the tusker even waited near the mangled corpse for over an hour. Sambada and Kanak News have reported that the tusker then started roaring, following which other members of the herd came to attack the village.
The tusker reportedly went to the village to attack the house of the woman it had killed earlier. The mud house was smashed and trampled by the elephant and even their goats were killed. The herd then attacked other houses, ate grains and went on a rampage breaking several houses.
The villagers have told Kanak News that they had run away then the elephant came to attack the corpse. They reportedly saw the elephant lifting the corpse and taking it away to trample and destroy it so brutally that her intestines came out. One woman who had climbed a tall tree to save her life had to spend the night on the treetop as the village was under attack.
It is notable here that elephant attacks are often reported in Odisha. Many parts of the state are forest-covered and man-animal conflicts have become increasingly common.
Though it is not known why the elephant had attacked the woman and displayed such behaviour even after attacking, the incident has sparked discussion about animals displaying a ‘vengeful’ behaviour, often towards humans who cross territories with them.
Elephants, long memory and ‘vengeful behaviour’ by animals
Elephants have a long memory. Some scientists studying elephant herds attacking villages in Kenya had theorised earlier that the attacks might be acts of ‘revenge’ over the widespread poaching activities in the region several years earlier. They have also reported that due to poaching and increasing competition for territories, elephants may even have grown to ‘dislike’ humans in certain cases.
A 2006 report in the New Scientist has stated that in some instances, even with plentiful territories and an abundance of food, some herds had repeatedly attacked villages, blocked roads, and caused damage to human settlements. The rampant poaching in the 1970s and 1980s is believed to have created a generation of young elephants who had witnessed the death of family members, often their own matriarch, and growing up without the guidance of the matriarch may have made them experience the elephantine equivalent of post-traumatic stress disorder.
“They are certainly intelligent enough and have good enough memories to take revenge”, Dr Joyce Poole, the research director at the Amboseli Elephant Research Project in Kenya was quoted.
The ‘revenge’ acts are not limited to humans. There have been reports of elephants targeting, chasing and brutally killing rhinos and other beasts. Incidents of ‘revenge’ attacks in India have not been limited to elephants either. In Kerala, a tiger was reported to stalk and kill the very poacher that had killed its mate. A female leopard in Himachal was tracked to have crossed into Uttarakhand and Uttar Pradesh following the same route a poacher had taken after capturing her cubs and taking them away.
In Russia’s far-eastern Primorye region in 1997, an Amur tiger was documented to have stalked a poacher named Vladimir Markov. Markov had shot and injured the massive tiger and had even stolen the carcass of the animal it had killed. The injured tiger had stalked the poacher, found his cabin, destroyed every object that had Markov’s scent and then had waited for Markov to come. When Markov finally came, the tiger had dragged him into the bushes and had eaten him.
This will move you !! Funeral procession of the weeping elephants carrying dead body of the child elephant. The family just don’t want to leave the baby. pic.twitter.com/KO4s4wCpl0
— Parveen Kaswan (@ParveenKaswan) June 7, 2019
Elephants have been known to display behaviours associated with a long memory. They mourn their dead and even come back to the place where their calves had died.
