A woman in India last week was trampled by a wild elephant that later returned to attack the woman’s body during her funeral, the New York Post reports.
According to the Indian online newspaper The Print, Maya Murmu, 70, was collecting water from a well in the village of Raipal when a wild elephant, described as a "tusker" — meaning that its tusks are so long that they reach the ground — that escaped from Dalma Wildlife Sanctuary trampled her. Murmu was brought to a nearby hospital, where she died from the injuries, according to Rasgovindpur police station inspector Lopamudra Nayak.
Later that night, as family members performed her last rites, which involve burning the corpse on a funeral pyre, the elephant returned, lifted Murmu’s body, and threw it in the air before leaving. The family recovered the body and continued the ceremony, according to witnesses.
"These endangered elephants can be deadly dangerous, particularly when provoked or abused," said Duncan McNair, an attorney who established the conservation group Save the Asian Elephants, told Newsweek when asked about the incident.
McNair noted that "elephants are generally benign, and passive ... they don't rush out of nowhere to attack people that pose no threat to their safety, or babies or to anything like that. [This event] is surprising because it shows no provocation of the elephant."
He added: "It's just possible that if [the elephant] was in proximity still at the time of the funeral, and that's not clear, that it will have recognized the remains. And it may have seen or smelled that and it may have associated that woman with some catastrophe to it or its herd. That is quite possible.”
Theodore Bunker ✉
Theodore Bunker, a Newsmax writer, has more than a decade covering news, media, and politics.
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