Two elephants, including a calf died due to electrocution here following which the forest department authorities placed two officials under suspension.
The incident took place last night at Potapada village, when the two tuskers - a 30-year-old female elephant and a one year-old calf came in contact with a sagging high tension line, said Pradipta Kumar Sahu, the Dhenkanal divisional forest officer.
He said two forest officials - a forester and a forest guard are placed under suspension and the department has registered a case against the executive engineer, assistant engineer and one line man of the CESU (central electricity supply utility).
The CESU officials have been charged of dereliction of duty, officials said.
"The two elephants died after coming in contact with the 33-KV high tension electric wire. Though we had given information to CESU regarding sagging of electric wire on the elephant passage, they did not act at proper time," the DFO said.
As per forest department reports, the jumbos have changed their path due to the ongoing construction of Rengali canal. There are electric wires strung at low height at various places through which the pachyderms pass.
