Child, grandfather sustain gunshot injury during elephant attack in Bengal

A four-year-old West Bengal girl and her grandfather sustained pellet injuries in an accidental fire from a shotgun being used by a state forest department official to scare away wild elephants from a Jalpaiguri village on Friday afternoon.

The shotgun went off after it was accidentally dropped by the forest department staff, while trying to deal with the pachyderm and the crowd of locals at the Bamantari village. When he tried to lift the gun, it went off. Angry villagers allegedly manhandled some forest department staff. The incident happened in the Dhupguri community block area.

Laxmi Modak (4) and Promod Modok (60) were first taken to Jalpaiguri hospital and later shifted to North Bengal Medical College and Hospital in Siliguri on Friday night.

“It was an accident. We have taken responsibility for their treatment,” said Nisha Goswami, divisional forest officer, Gorumara wildlife division.

V K Sood, additional principal chief conservator of forest, said “The child and her grandfather were brought to Siliguri for better treatment.”

A tusker, which created most of the havoc, did not leave the village till Friday evening. It was part of a large herd that raided two villages and damaged many houses and crops.

A large number of people had gathered to watch the herd. Personnel from Binnaguri Wildlife Squad and Nathua range rushed to the village and tried to drive the pachyderms back into the forest. The crowd made their job difficult, a forest department official said on condition of anonymity.

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