Four people, including a 12-year-old girl and two women, were trampled to death by a tusker at Ganeshapuram and Vellalore areas located in the outskirts of Coimbatore city during the wee hours on Friday.
The deceased were identified as Gayathri,12, daughter of Vijayakumar of Ganeshapuram, P Palanisamy, 73, B Nagarathinam, 50, and her friend M Jothimani, 68, all from Vellalore.
The 12-year-old and her father Vijayakumar were fast asleep in the verandah of her house when the tusker, which had strayed into the locality from the Madukkarai forest, trampled her to death around 3.30 AM in morning. Seeing this, forest department officials urged people to stay at home to avoid further man-animal conflicts.
This elephant responsible for the menace moved away from that area and went on to attack three more people including two women and grievously injured them. Cops said that although they were immediately rushed to the hospital nearby, they did not respond to the treatment and passed away.
Also, reports say that forest department officials were taking an effort to drive away elephants by bringing in 'Kumkis' (tamed elephants) and also try to tranquilise it.
