Bandhavgarh elephant deaths: IFS officer failed to return from leave, switched off his phone, states suspension order

The order states that Chaudhary, a 2010 batch IFS officer, “violated Rule 3 of the All India Services (Conduct) Rules, 1968, by failing to return from leave despite being informed by the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) and Chief Wildlife Warden, Madhya Pradesh, and by keeping his mobile phone switched off, thereby disobeying senior directives and neglecting official duties”.

“During the suspension period, his headquarters will be the Office of the Principal Chief Conservator of Forests and Head of Forest Force, Bhopal,” the order reads. Despite calls and messages by The Indian Express, Chaudhary was not available for comment.

Ninama, the order states, failed to “provide timely and capable leadership during the investigation of the case” and “delegated most of the proceedings to subordinates without fulfilling his official duties”.

Ninama told The Indian Express that he was “punished for being a hard worker”. “I am not sad about the suspension, but about the elephant deaths… I oversee three zones, which have 70-80 villages. They all grow kodo (millets, speculated to be the cause of the elephant deaths). Can the staff track elephants everywhere? We don’t have the resources to track them all.”

Giving details of the incident, Ninama said, “The elephants must have fallen sick in the night. My staff was in a different beat. The farmers whose kodo millets the elephants ate were also not home. We had no information. When the elephants were found, I called doctors and wildlife officials from many districts. They all took several hours to come. We could not save a single elephant despite our best efforts.”

On Sunday, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Mohan Yadav said that it was a new experience for officials to deal with a large herd turning up at the area, and “all officers, including field directors, need to be alert” on movements of large herds in the eastern part of the state.

“Even after such a big incident, the Field Director did not come back from leave. There has also been negligence on his part in dealing with the movement of large herds in the area,” Yadav said.

On the cause of death, Yadav said, “We have not received anything on the use of pesticides on the crops. The postmortem report will be sent to us in two-three days.”

The government has announced a slew of measures to deal with elephants in the state. The Forest Department is deliberating on forming an elephant task force to strategise ways to ensure that forest officials are equipped to deal with the tuskers. The government is planning on bringing out a policy where experts from Kerala, Assam and Karnataka, where there is substantial elephant population, would advise local officials on best practices.

The government has also announced that it will begin “radio tagging lone males, which usually separate from the herd”, and make their own territories and sometimes end up in encounters with humans. On Saturday, two men were killed after they were attacked by elephants in the same district.

The government is also planning on ramping up the Hathi Mitra initiative to minimise instances of human-animal conflict.

Since it is speculated that the elephants died after ingesting kodo millets, the government is planning on introducing solar powered electric fencing around the crops to deter the elephants from approaching the fields.

Ten wild elephants from a herd of 13 died over the past week in Madhya Pradesh’s Bandhavgarh Tiger Reserve. Principal Chief Conservator of Forests (Wildlife) Vijay N Ambade said in a statement that the deaths could have been caused by “mycotoxins associated with kodo millet”