Spikes, fireballs not being used to drive away elephants: SC told

The governments of Karnataka, West Bengal and Jharkhand told the Supreme Court today that they were not using spikes and fireballs to drive away elephants in their respective states.

A bench comprising Justices Madan B Lokur, Deepak Gupta and K M Joseph was told by the counsel appearing for Karnataka that the state government had issued direction to the concerned authority on July 12 to remove all spikes and never to use it again.

Similarly, the advocates representing West Bengal and Jharkhand told the court that they have not used any such methods to drive away elephants and no tenders were issued regarding procurement of either spikes or fireballs.

The counsel representing the West Bengal government said that authorities were using torches and drums to make sound to drive away elephants and they would file an affidavit in this regard within a week.

While Karnataka's counsel said that their affidavit was ready and they would file it during the course of the day, the lawyer appearing for Jharkhand said they have already filed their affidavit in the matter.

Meanwhile, the bench expressed its displeasure that no advocate was present on behalf of the Odisha government and observed, "Odisha is not bothered about it".

The bench has posted the matter for hearing after 10 days.

The apex court had last week termed as "barbaric" the use of spikes and fireballs to drive away elephants and said that states should be desisted from using any such methods.

The court had observed this after it was told that these methods were allegedly adopted in states like Karnataka, West Bengal, Jharkhand and Odisha.

The court was hearing a petition which has raised the matter of tenders allegedly issued in these states on the use of spikes and fireballs to drive away elephants.