Train halts for 2 hrs waiting for elephant to give birth on tracks in Ramgarh

Ramgarh: A goods train carrying coal was stopped for over two hours so that a pregnant elephant, who was in labour on the track, could give birth to a calf undisturbed.

The incident took place between Barkakana and Hazaribag stations along the Ranci-Koderma via Barkakana route of the Eastern Central Railway. Since the particular track is primarily used for goods transportation, no passenger train was affected. The incident, however, happened two weeks ago but the because the area is too deep inside the forest, the video of the incident went viral only on Tuesday.

Forest officials contacted the railways to immediately halt the goods trains for a few hours to ensure that both the jumbo and calf were safe.

Both the elephant and its calf are safe and healthy after the forest department along with the locals followed up on the issue and ensured a safe passage for them. Divisional forest officer (DFO), Ramgarh, Nitish Kumar confirmed videos of the incident which were clicked by a forest guard and locals went viral.

"At 3 am, our forest guard informed me that a pregnant female elephant is lying on the tracks with labour pain. He also warned that it might get run over by a train and requested me to stop all train movement along the route. I immediately contacted the railway control room in Barkakana and directed them to stop all trains, following which the movement of trains was stopped for two hours," he added.

Notably, Jharkhand reported a staggering loss of 474 human lives in man-elephant conflicts during the past five years, making the state's fatality figure second only to Odisha in the country, former Union minister of state for environment, forest and climate change, Kriti Vardhan Singh said in a written response in the Lok Sabha.

Moreover, 30 elephants died in Jharkhand because of electrocution and various other reasons like man-elephant conflict and collisions with trains from 2019 till July 2024, the Parliament was told.