Wild elephant tramples man

Tirupur: A wild elephant trampled a 25-year-old man to death in Anamalai Tiger Reserve (ATR) near Udumalpet on Tuesday night.
The deceased, M Palanisamy, was a resident of Kulipatti, a hilly hamlet of scheduled community people 110km away from Udumalpet.
Palanisamy was on the way to his home with a neighbour on a motorcycle when the elephant attacked them around 11pm, a police officer said. “Though the duo fled on foot, the elephant gave chase and trampled Palanisamy. He died on the spot,” the officer added.
Residents of the hamlet recovered the corpse and took it to the settlement.
A team of officials from forest, revenue and police departments reached the settlement along a medical team from the Udumalpet Government Hospital to conduct postmortem on Wednesday. But the villagers stopped the team demanding compensation for Palanisamy’s family.
Though the officials tried to convince them that the solatium would be given only after the postmortem, the villagers stood firm. Subsequently, forest department officials handed over Rs 50,000 as initial compensation.
The medical team conducted the postmortem and the deceased was cremated on Wednesday night.
The Dhally police have registered a case.