The location was a forest area between Mundur and Dhoni in the Palakkad district. Forest officials led by Chief Veterinary Surgeon Arun Zachariah tranquillised and caged the wild jumbo called PT 7 on Sunday, which had been giving sleepless nights to residents of the area. At the end of the operation, PT 7 was officially named ‘Dhoni’ by Kerala Forest Minister A K Saseendran, after the hamlet where it had spread panic for more than six months.
Dhoni is a reserve forest about 12 km from Palakkad town with misty mountains and a waterfall. The tracking and darting teams had launched efforts to trap the elephant from dawn on Saturday. However, they could not make any headway as the animal moved into thick forests and stood on steep terrain, making shooting tranquillisers challenging. Led by mahouts, three kumki (training) elephants Bharath, Vikram and Surendran brought from the Muthanga wildlife sanctuary in Wayanad surrounded the jumbo.
They stood guard as the team covered the motionless animal’s eyes with a black cloth to prevent the sunlight from hitting its eyes and provoking it. On July 8 last year, a jumbo killed a person called Sivaraman near Dhoni. He was out for a morning walk when the animal chased him to a paddy field and gored him. According to locals, the elephant was PT 7.
Now ‘Dhoni’ in his new avatar will also join the forest team of Kumki elephants after learning the tricks.
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