Girish, who was employed with the forest department(Kushalnagar Range) and was part of Rapid Response Team, was killed by a wild elephant yesterday. A wild elephant had attacked a resident of Kedakal and he had a narrow escape after jumping off from his bike. Later the forest department got involved in chasing back the herd from the estates back to the forest. But, a tusker charged at the team and the melee Girish was caught by the tusker and gored. Girish was shifted to the District Hospital, but he couldn’t be saved.
The forest department claimed that while they were involved in the chasing the herd, a the tusker ambushed the team and caught them off-guard.
This is a second such incident within a week. Last week HH Venkatesh, another forest staff who tried to tranquilize a tusker was killed by the tusker in a coffee estate during a rescue operation in Hassan.
