Iron ore then, coal now: Elephants in Odisha await another wave of displacement

New Indian Express

2 days ago

Like Keonjhar's iron ore reserves, Angul's coal blocks are tightly grouped, leaving very little space for transit and movement of the big animals. An elephant movement toposheet generated by the Forest department for Angul showed large groups of elephants using compact areas located to the south of coal blocks, much closer to urban, semi-urban and rural settlements.
It is in this region that human-elephant conflict has grown alarmingly. Growing number of industries, linear infrastructure such as irrigation, national highways as well as power lines have already left elephant movement and migration restricted. The fragmented migration corridors have added to their problem. With more coal mines in the offing, the future looks ominous.
The human-elephant conflict (HEC) data is telling. Between 2019-20 and 2024-25, Angul district reported 68 elephant deaths. During the period, 124 human lives were lost to elephant attacks. In terms of depredation, crop damage area jumped from 2,678 acre in 2019-20 to 3,453 acre in 2024-25. The government paid about Rs 20 crore towards crop damage compensation whereas total compassionate payment was Rs 26 crore. In the 10 years between 2014 and 2024, Angul and Dhenkanal districts, one of the worst HEC zones of the country, reported 216 elephant deaths, close to 28 per cent of the fatalities (776) recorded in the state.
Dr Sreedhar Vijayakrishnan, research affiliate with Sri Lanka-based Centre for Conservation and Research, says elephants being extremely adaptive animals can modify their behaviour to avoid regions overlapping humans while also exploiting the resources through crop raiding. Studies in Sri Lanka and Malaysia shows elephants prefer these disturbed areas because of the high-level of nutrition available there, he points out.
'Though not directly comparable to coal mining, oil palm plantation establishment in Malaysia is a relevant example. To meet the global demand for oil palm, large-scale rainforests were removed in south-east Asian countries like Malaysia and Cambodia. As more and more oil palm plantations were established, elephants tend to be using the modified or disturbed or secondary areas more than the rainforests which means conflict could be intense,' he adds.
Against the conventional notion that elephants use undisturbed, contiguous primary forests, evidence is to the contrary. 'Of course, we need primary, contiguous forests for long-term conservation, but elephants are going to use these disturbed areas also. In oil palm regions of Malaysia, measures such as translocations have been carried out, which have often been futile. Elephants continue to use these areas due to the high resource availability in the plantations. In coalfields, however, resources are limited and disturbances are high, which could lead to displacement of elephants and in turn increased conflicts in neighbouring areas. It's a possibility, I foresee,' he says.
If coal mining triggers more displacement of elephants, crop raids and property damage may spike. There will be increased use of electrified fences, traps and retaliatory killings. In the last one month-and-a-half, five elephants died in charged solar fences under Angul forest circle alone.