Guwahati, Dec. 20: A single shot from a hunter’s rifle that had brought relief to hundreds hounded by a “rogue” elephant, has enraged numerous wildlife NGOs, which feel that the hunt was a patchwork solution to an escalating problem.

A tusker that had been terrorising villagers in Sonitpur district and nicknamed Laden after the elusive terrorist, was killed by a hunter in Behali tea estate on December 16.

Denouncing the killing, members of several NGOs working in the wildlife sector — including Nature’s Bonyapran, Aaranyak, WWF-India, Dolphin Foundation, Ecosystems-India — today said at a media conference that the root causes of the increasing number of elephant-human conflict in the state must be addressed first.

The NGOs even claimed that there was lack of substantial logic behind proclaiming the elephant as “rogue”.

The opinion of the public as well as various stakeholders and experts working in the field of human-elephant conflict could have been sought before taking the hasty decision, the members felt.

The act of killing also violates Section 11 of the Wildlife Protection Act, which states that “no wild animal shall be killed unless all possible options of capturing, translocating and tranquillising are exhausted”, the NGOs claimed.

“If we have to kill ‘rogues’ then there are about 50 elephants which are indulging in destruction,” said Kushal Konwar Sharma, an elephant expert.

There were no forests left on the north bank for the elephants to survive, forcing them to stray into human habitat, he said.

“Encroachments have to be stopped if we want to conserve the elephants,” said Gautam Narayan of Ecosystems-India.

Most felt sad that while the crucial issues of encroachment and destruction of forests are not given adequate attention by the authorities, the government seems to be eager to proclaim homeless and displaced elephants as “rogues”.

Figures revealed that of the 14,016 hectares of Behali reserve forest, 3,375 hectares have been encroached upon.

The organisations have requested chief minister Tarun Gogoi to direct the forest department not to proclaim any wild elephant a “rogue” without clearing the forest areas of encroachers.