A herd of 50 elephants rampaged through a four-acre park at Guriguripal on Saturday night, breaking boundary walls and damaging several structures, including slides and sitting arrangements.

The animals have been roaming in the jungles of West Midnapore’s Guriguripal, about 15km from Midnapore town, for the past six months.

The Bengal forest department maintains the 10-year-old park located between a thicket and cropland. The park has an artificial pond which attracted elephants in the past.

On Sunday morning, it was found that in addition to damaging the park, the elephants had also eaten or damaged most of the paddy on the farmland surrounding the park.

An official of Midnapore Sadar block administration said it would be risky to reconstruct the wall and other structures till the herd was driven away.

A few structures damaged in the park Picture by Saikat Santra

“Earlier, there were fewer elephants in the area but now, the herd has increased to about 50. So, we don’t want to take up repairs until the herd leaves the area,” said an official.

Rabindranath Saha, the divisional forest officer of Midnapore range, said: “The herd has increased in number over the past six months in the Midnapore Sadar block. Nine persons have been killed by elephants over the past six months in West Midnapore district. There is another herd that is roaming in the jungles of Kharagpur block about 40km away.”

A senior forester said the department was running short of manpower and was not in a position to tackle such a big herd.

“We are planning to enlist the help of our counterparts in Jaldapara in north Bengal. We will get a special type of gun that fires ‘chilli bombs’. These are used to drive away elephants,” the officer said.

Saha said in addition to Gurguripal, the 50-member marauding herd had caused scare in in the forest villages of Dumurkota, Junesole, Panjasole, Shukhnakhali, Gurabandi, Chandra and Pirakata also.