Single elephant suspected to have killed as many as 13 people in just a week in Indian jungle

Forest official says tusker turns violent after dark, attacking villagers and their homes, and disappears inside jungle during day

A rampaging elephant has killed at least 17 people amid an intensifying man-animal conflict in eastern India.

Authorities in Jharkhand state said an adult male elephant had carried out at least a dozen attacks in seven days across the Saranda forest belt. It killed 13 people in two days, including four members of a family, in separate attacks in the West Singhbhum district.

Chaibasa divisional forest officer Aditya Narayan said the tusker had been moving violently across the region for several days and changing its location rapidly, which made it difficult to track.

“The elephant appears to have turned rogue and our focus now is to tranquilise it at the earliest. We are certain it is in musth, which explains its heightened aggression. We’re trying our best to control the situation," he was quoted as saying by the Times of India. Musth is a periodic condition in bull elephants marked by heightened aggression and a surge in reproductive hormones.

The forest department has reportedly deployed around 80 personnel to control the animal and divert it to a safer location. Experts from the neighbouring state of West Bengal state have also been roped in to steer the elephant back into the forest.

The region is gripped by fear, villagers say, with families staying indoors and voicing particular concern for the safety of children and the elderly. Authorities have urged residents to avoid forested areas and remain vigilant.

Smita Pankaj, regional chief conservator of forests, told the newspaper the pattern of attacks remained consistent. “The elephant turns violent after dark, attacking houses and villagers,” she explained. “It moves extremely fast and keeps changing locations, repeatedly giving our teams the slip. But during the day, it almost becomes invisible, hiding deep inside the forests.”

Jharkhand has recorded nearly 1,300 deaths due to elephant attacks over the past 23 years, according to a recent study by the Wildlife Institute of India.

The elephant's erratic movement has forced the railways to cancel six pairs of trains in the region.

India’s environment ministry told the parliament earlier this year that about 80 wild elephants had been killed nationwide after being hit by trains between 2020-21 and 2024-25.

In one of the latest such incidents, eight tuskers were killed in late December when a passenger train struck a herd in the northeastern state of Assam, railway authorities said.