People donate land, to cultivate paddy for elephant to avoid human-animal conflict

To prevent man-elephant conflict, people have decided to cultivate paddy and grass, liked by the animal, in over 200 hectares of land. The idea is to keep them restricted to that area.

Nagaon: The people in Nagaon bordering Karbi Anglong have come up with a unique idea to deal with the ever-increasing human-elephant conflict in the area.

Led by environmentalist Binod Dulu Bora, the locals decided to cultivate paddy in 200 hectares of land in the hills for the elephants. The idea is to keep the animal away from the residential areas, thereby reducing the human-elephant conflict.

The residents of the Hatikhuli area have donated their fields towards the cause and are cultivating paddy in those fields for the elephants. By doing so, they believe, the animal would be confined to that area only and won't hurt their interests by entering into residential areas.

Along with paddy, the people have also cultivated two types of grass eaten by elephants in 45 acres of land. NGO Hasti Bandhu and famous documentary filmmaker Mike Pandey are also helping the people to achieve their goal of reducing ever-increasing human-elephant conflict in the area.