To see a wild tusker from really close has been a cherished dream. But the other night when one came calling in Munnar, I was blissfully asleep. For, it chose an unearthly hour for its visit — around 2 am. However, my son woke up and spied on it.It was a huge beast with a pair of vicious-looking tusks — long, narrow and curved. Finding no vegetables, it tore up clods of grass from the lawn just outside his bedroom window and wolfed them down. Indeed it was close enough for him to hear its abdominal rumblings! Later it savagely trampled a white-draped scarecrow that had the audacity to confront it!Next morning we found the intruder beside a stream, looking quite unrepentant about the previous night’s depredations — which included terrorising a neighbour and bulldozing the front of a house, fortunately unoccupied. Aggressiveness personified, it defiantly blocked the path of estate workers, forcing them to take a detour. Once it even advanced menacingly, sending them scampering.From across the narrow valley I watched, in awe, as the tusker repeatedly scooped up trunkfuls of earth and tossed them over its back, obviously enjoying its ‘sand-bath’. Mostly it remained stationary, tail swinging pendulum-like, ears flapping languidly and trunk probing the vegetation. It seemed to be dourly contemplating its next move.For three days and nights it haunted the area, keeping locals on tenterhooks. None ventured out after dusk. Motorists dreaded running into the beast. Bonfires were lit to keep it away from housing colonies. Yet the pachyderm remained unfazed. Surprisingly, none realised it craved the locally grown vegetables on which it had feasted in the past. Indeed these were the magnets that irresistibly lured elephants to the area. But, having had their vegetable gardens regularly raided and ruined exasperated the locals, who had abandoned them. And deprived of these succulent goodies, the pachyderms now vent their ire on buildings, vehicles and humans in an ever-worsening confrontation.
