MADIKERI: Four female elephants, including two calves, were electrocuted when they stepped on a live wire in a coffee estate in Kodagu district's Siddapura in the early hours of Tuesday.This is the second such incident in June. Two elephants died when they touched a low-hanging power cable in Siddapura about two weeks ago.Forest department sources said a herd of elephants was foraging for food in the coffee estates of Siddapura's Kannangala village late Monday night and one elephant accidentally touched an electric cable that had fallen to the ground. The animal died instantly. Three more mammals met the same fate in minutes. The elephants were aged 40, 36, 6 and 3.Coffee-estate labourers who reported for duty early morning were shocked to see four dead elephants on the ground. The animals were surrounded by a mourning herd. Villagers used firecrackers to send the herd away and informed deputy range forest officer Devaiah about the tragedy.The officer told TOI that the negligence of Chamundeshwari Electricity Supply Corporation , which supplies power to the region, led to both incidents. After the June 14 incident, a police complaint had been filed against the escom, and the forest department had directed the power supply group to re-draw power lines and remove faulty ones.Sources in the forest department said that if the power supply company had acted on the complaint and cleared sagging and snapped cables, the lives of elephants could have been saved.

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