Bhubaneswar: Eight out of the 49 elephants which were poached by hunters across India in 2021 were from Odisha. According to a response by the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau (WCCB) to an RTI query, law-enforcement agencies arrested 77 persons in connection with these 49 elephant killings during 2021.
The maximum killings were recorded in Assam (9) followed by West Bengal, Odisha and Tamil Nadu (8 each), Karnataka and Uttarakhand (3 each). Both Kerala and Arunachal Pradesh logged two cases of elephant killings while Rajasthan, Himachal Pradesh, Bihar, Meghalaya, Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra had one case each, the WCCB said.
In terms of arrests related to the killings of elephants, the maximum 17 people were held in Tamil Nadu followed by 15 in Assam, 13 in Odisha, 11 in West Bengal. Five people were held in Kerala, four each in Uttarakhand and Bihar, three in Maharashtra, two each in Meghalaya and Rajasthan and one in Karnataka, it added.
