About a fortnight after a 14-member team of Mahouts arrived from Bengal’s Bankura district to Chandil, for removing a menacing herd of wild elephants from there, another team reached the same area on Saturday evening.

A second herd of 25 elephants reached the human habitats near the Chandil forest range, due to which the Forest Department had to call in the elephant drivers. The total number of migratory elephants in the area has increased to 48.

The forest department was also determined to tackle the menace caused by the elephants effectively, as local drivers have stopped working after their leader was killed by one of the mammals near Balidih village near the Bengal border on November 20.

Chandil forest ranger Ashok Kumar said there are three herds of 48 elephants at the moment, which are anchored near the human habitats in Nimdih and Ichagarh blocks under the Chandil forest range in the adjoining Seraikela-Kharsawan district about 45 kms away from Jamshedpur.

“Earlier in the third week of November, there was a single herd of five elephants, which was moving close to the human habitats of Balidih and Dhunaburu villages. But later the number of elephants in the herd swelled to 17, after a dozen more wild mammals joined them. The situation got worse as a herd of 25 elephants, inclusive of five calves, has come from Chaibasa jungle to Ichagarh and are damaging paddy crops as well as houses,” Kumar told The Telegraph Online.

He added that apart from these two groups, another herd of six elephants have joined in, likely from the Tamar jungle.

“The herd of 25 elephants has been causing damage to the crops and houses since the past one week, leading us to engage the Mahouts from Bankura to drive it away toward Kharsawan so that it may return to the Chaibasa jungle,” Kumar said.

However, according to him, despite much efforts the mahouts could not drive them away.

“This was the reason that we had to call in another team of mahouts from Bankura,” he added.

Kumar informed that the 14-member team arrived soon after their request on Saturday evening, and were sent to Ichagarh, where they have started working jointly with the other team to drive away the mammals on Sunday morning.

The forest ranger said that unlike the locals, mahouts from Bankura were brave and could work effectively. He revealed that during the day, the Bankura team uses firecrackers and at night, they resort to ‘mashals’ (lanterns) to drive the animals away.

On the other hand, the locals tend to drive away elephants from a distance and use just firecrackers for their work.

Kumar, while giving details about the largest herd, said that out of the five calves, one is very small and that was the reason the group was not moving fast.

“Elephants tend to keep pace with the small calf's movement irrespective of the pressure mounted on them. But still both the teams from Bengal have started the work as moving them from the Chandil forest area is our first priority,” the ranger said.

Kumar further told that after this group goes, the mahouts will work on driving away the herd of 17 elephants, and subsequently the smallest one.