Brutality, man-made disasters cause regular elephant deaths With their habitat shrinking fast, elephants are regularly falling prey to human brutality and man-made disasters. The last few days have been especially tragic for these gentle beasts. After the shooting down of a tusker in Ranipur Jhal area of Hardwar district last Thursday, an elephant and her one-year-old calf were electrocuted near Dimna lake near Jamshedpur on Monday while the decomposed body of another pachyderm was discovered at the Corbett Tiger Reserve in Uttarakhand.