A man in India was crushed to death by an elephant after the herd, which was calmly crossing a road, was heckled by a group of villagers.
The incident took place in a village in the eastern state of Assam on Sunday. The herd, which included calves, was crossing a road when the villagers began making loud noises to distract them. Some even tried to get close to the elephants.
Suddenly, an elephant lost its cool and turned toward the villagers before chasing them. As the crowd attempted to flee, a man, identified as Pascal Munda, lost footing and fell down, following which he was crushed to death. The elephant then went back to its herd afterward.
The video of the incident was shared on Twitter by Indian Forest Service officer Parveen Kaswan on Monday.
In the video, around 15 elephants can be seen crossing the road when villagers, gathered on both sides of the road, start teasing and irritating them. Suddenly, an elephant gets irked and starts chasing the crowd before crushing a villager to death. The victim was reportedly rushed to a local hospital, where he was declared dead on arrival.
The 45-minute clip has since gone viral on social media with over 176,000 views. Several Twitter users took to the comments section to blame the villagers for the incident.
"Blame is on humans only for having disturbed habitat of those animals. We have intruded their space," one person commented.
"Tragic... They should have been calmly bowed down and given respect to the magnificent creature and let them pass to (the) jungle. Instead, they were rioting and made havoc that resulted in a loss of precious life. What a waste, and also horrifying. Blame to the crowd collectively," another person wrote.
"Can not decide who are the real "animals" here. One group is silently crossing a field. Another group is screaming, running, throwing stones. Really tough to decide," another user commented.
"Unfortunately it's the humans here to blame ... Had they just kept quiet ...and stayed put I don't believe anything would have happened," a person wrote.
Representational image. Photo: AFP / Biju BORO
