Biplab Hazra’s photograph titled “Hell is Here,” shot in West Bengal’s Bankura district won the Sanctuary Wildlife Photography Awards of the year on Wednesday.
The photograph captures a screaming baby elephant and its mother running in confusion and pain down the middle of a road. “The heat from the fire scorches their delicate skin as mother and child attempt to flee the mob…Flaming tar balls and crackers fly through the air to a soundtrack of human laughter and shouts,” Mr. Hazra described in the caption of the picture, published in sanctuaryasia.com.
The man-elephant conflict has been happening throughout the country. India consists of over 70 per cent of the global population of Asian elephants, and reports of clashes between men and elephants in other States of India – Tamil Nadu, Assam, Chhatisgarh, and Odisha, home to these pachyderms – is common.
In Bengal alone about 700 elephants reside. North Bengal, which has relatively vast forest patches, sustains about 600 elephants, but the habitat of south Bengal, which now has about 140-150 elephants, “cannot sustain” such large population, ecologist and expert on elephants, Professor Raman Sukumar, told The Hindu last year.
The rage of the elephant is often a reaction to the cruelty it faces. In a separate interview Karnataka’s state-appointed honorary wildlife warden Nirad Muthanna explained: “Elephants have very sensitive ears. They get annoyed when exposed to loud noises like crackers going off. It is a completely unfamiliar atmosphere for them.”
Although there are many steps taken by the authorities and conservationists to deal with the man-elephant conflict, a feasible plan is yet to be derived. It's commonly suggested that if the elephants and men stay within clearly-defined territories, there will be less traumatic incidents for the animals and less conflict for the two.