Five persons were trampled to death by a tusker in Jharkhand’s Lohardaga district, forcing the authorities to seek the help of expert elephant chasers from Bankura in Bengal.

According to divisional forest officer, Lohardaga, Arvind Kumar, the elephant killed a 35-year-old woman at Masihatu village of Kuru block in Lohardaga around 8pm on Sunday and on Monday morning, it trampled two women aged 25 and 35 years respectively and a 55-year-old man at Kaspur village in Bhandariya block of the district.

Later, around 3.30pm in the same village, an inebriated man aged 35 years went close to the elephant despite a warning by forest staff and was trampled to death.

“We are not sure if it is the same elephant which had killed three persons in Hazaribagh. But it seems to be the same one as it has strayed away from the herd and Lohardaga is on the border between Hazaribagh and Latehar. It killed the woman on Sunday night and then moved 20km to the Bhandariya block to kill the other persons. Elephants move at night and stay put during day time. We tried our best to drive away the elephant during the day but failed. We sought help from the Bankura elephant chaser team and they have arrived at Lohardaga,” informed Arvind Kumar.

The team from Bengal which is popularly known as the “hula party” will make an attempt to drive away the elephant back to the forest.