A herd of around five wild elephants raided Simuldanga village in Jhargram early on Wednesday and damaged at least ten mud houses in search of food.

However, there was no report of casualties as the residents managed to flee their houses.

“According to primary reports, around 10 houses were damaged. The actual assessment of the damage will come after the completion of field survey report,” said Pankaj Suryawanshi, the divisional forest officer of Jhargram.

The villagers, however, claimed that the pachyderms had completely destroyed at least 10 houses and a dozen more partially. “A herd of around 30-40 elephants reached the area early on Wednesday and at least five of them entered our village. They started destroying the mud houses one after another. Fortunately, there was no loss of lives,” said a villager Tukuram Mahato.

Birbaha Hansda, the junior forest minister, said she had asked the department to arrange food and shelter for those affected following the attack by the elephants.

A forester said there was a crisis of human resources to steer away the animals as a section of Hula Party members went on strike in the Jhargram division after two of their colleagues were killed in an elephant attack on July 14.

A Hula Party is a squad of local villagers deployed by the forest department to drive away elephants from human settlement.

A large number of Hula Party members in Jhargramwent on strike on Monday and decided not to back to their assignments till the government fulfilled their demands. “We will not work until our demands like insurance for each of their colleagues and a monthly salary of Rs 10,000 are met. The death of two of our colleagues has opened our eyes,” said Bharat Chandra Mahato, a Hula Party member.

Jhargram DFO Pankaj Suryawanshi said some officials were assigned to convince the Hula Party members and a section of the members had already been convinced.

In Jhargram, the human-animal conflict has claimed many lives over the past two years posing a problem for the foresters.