A 55-year-old man was killed in an elephant attack in Raigarh district after he entered a forest area to collect firewood, officials said on Saturday.
The deceased, identified as Malikram Banjara of Indkalo village under the Dharamjaigarh forest division, had gone to the Chhenapatra forest area on Friday but failed to return home by evening. Concerned family members and villagers later began searching for him.
His body was subsequently found inside the forest, and preliminary investigation by forest officials confirmed that he had been trampled to death by an elephant. The incident took place in the Alola beat of the Kapu range, where a lone elephant that strayed from neighbouring Surguja district has been roaming for the past few days.
Forest department teams had already been alerting nearby villagers through public announcements, advising them not to venture into the forest because of elephant movement. After receiving information about the incident, forest officials reached the spot and sent the body for postmortem examination.
Officials said awareness drives are regularly being conducted in the region to caution residents about elephant movement, especially during early morning and evening hours when encounters are more likely. Raigarh and adjoining forest divisions have seen a steady rise in human-elephant conflict in recent years, with incidents of crop damage, destruction of houses, and fatal attacks becoming a growing concern for local residents and forest authorities.
