COIMBATORE: A 40-year-old tribal was trampled to death by a wild elephant near Kotagiri in Nilgiris.

The deceased, K Shanmugam, a farmer from ‘Keezh Koopu’ Irular village had gone for work as usual to his coffee farm on Monday morning.

“As he did not return home till late in the night, the family members and other villagers had gone on a frantic search for him on Tuesday morning. They were shocked to find Shanmugam lying dead near his farm,” said a forest department staff.

As they found traces of elephant movement in the locality, the villagers informed the forest department, who arrived and sent the body of the deceased for a post-mortem at Kotagiri Government Hospital. The forest department officials gave an initial compensation of Rs 50,000 to the kin of the deceased.

In another wildlife related incident in the hill district, a more than ten member herd ransacked a Primary Health Centre (PHC) at Barwood area in ‘O’ Valley in Gudalur taluk on Tuesday early morning.

They entered the PHC by breaking the doors and windows, before damaging the medical equipment and medicines stocked inside.

The villagers sought for building a compound wall around the PHC as the elephants had targeted the place before also.