A 15-year-old elephant has beenfound dead at a forest in Chhattisgarh's Jashpur district, an official said on Wednesday.Prima facie, poisoning seems to be the cause of death, divisional forest officer Shrikrishna Jadhav said.Some locals from Narayanpur village informed the authorities after spotting the carcass of a tusker in a nearby forest on Tuesday, he said.A team of forest officials rushed to the spot and sent the carcass for an autopsy."The exact cause of the elephant's death is yet to be ascertained as no injury mark was found on the carcass. Prima facie, the animal seems to have died due to poisoning," the official said.A team of veterinarians assisted by a scientist from the Wildlife Institute of India (WII) was conducting the postmortem and its report was awaited, he said.Forest officials believe the dead tusker belonged to a herd of elephants roaming in the area since last one month.In the past few years, there have been a number of human-elephant conflicts in the thick forested northern Chhattisgarh, comprising Surguja, Korba, Surajpur, Raigarh, Jashpur and Korea districts.The region has witnessed several killings of tribals as well as elephants and widespread damage to houses and crops by rogue pachyderms in past years.In December last year, a wild elephant was electrocuted to death after it came into contact with a live wire at a farm in Surajpur, while a pachyderm died after being stuck in a muddy field for three days in Korba.
