Brash Monkey

Thousands of monkeys uprooted by sprawl move into New Delhi

Posted at 3:17 PM on 14 Nov 2007

Last month, the deputy mayor of New Delhi fell from a terrace to his death while trying to fend off a gang of wild monkeys. This weekend, rampaging monkeys attacked up to 25 people in the Indian capital. While the scenes are tragic, it would be a stretch to call them unexpected: In the center of New Delhi, monkeys scamper through buildings, bathe in fountains, and frolic in parks and on groomed lawns. "They attack patients who are being rolled inside the hospital, pull out IV tubes, and scamper off to drink the fluids," says lawyer Meera Bhatia. Half a million people move into New Delhi every year; the consequential sprawl is gobbling up monkey habitat, forcing thousands of primates to become urban dwellers. City officials are redoubling removal efforts, but face opposition from animal-rights advocates and devout Hindus who believe the primates are an incarnation of the monkey god Hanuman.

sources: The New York Times, Agence France-Presse, Associated Press

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Comments: (4 comments)

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Removal?

When they say "removal" do they mean kill? There's got to be some way to deal with this problem humanely. Perhaps one action would be to establish more protected park land around the city. Also India needs more population planning programs in both the cities and rural areas, which would help control this sprawl.

by amc89 at 1:47 PM on 15 Nov 2007

Animal-rights agenda

We should make more of an effort to study the attitudes of that part of Hinduism (which is not so much a religion as a system of more or less related religious beliefs) that emphasizes high regard and good treatment of certain animals, e.g. cows and monkeys. I suspect there is much we could learn and borrow from them.

Chickens deserve our true friendship! So do fish! So do other sentient beings! Let us learn to be kind.

by caniscandida at 2:35 PM on 15 Nov 2007

Part of the problem

When they say "removed", I doubt they mean kill, since monkeys are worshipped in Hindu culture and killin' 'em is considered extremely taboo.

Actually, this parta the problem. The monkeys have become a tourist attraction, and since even talks of of removin' the monkeys to another location is likely to cause controversy, their numbers in the urban centers have grown.

Another problem is handouts. The reason why the cities can support so large of a population is the residents and tourists feed the monkeys on a regular basis. They've lost their fear of humans and have realized that humans in the city won't retaliate when they steal food or cause some very small property damage. It's kinda the same problem with ducks at some of the park ponds in America. People feed the animals until there are just too many and they run up the first person they see for food. Then, some eventually need to be removed to correct the problem.

They should worship the monkeys by preserving their natural habitat and limiting sprawl and logging efforts, not by handouts.

by Tasermons Partner at 4:13 PM on 15 Nov 2007

Monkey menace

Indians as a rule do not worship monkeys - although many Hindus worship Hanuman, the monkey god. However, Indian religions like Hinduism, Budhism, Jainism, teach respect for all life and encourage vegetarianism. So when they talk about removing monkeys, they mean shifting them to another place, maybe a jungle in reluctant states like Uttarakhand.

Having seen and experienced the problem first hand in India, I think the monkey proliferation in urban and semi-urban India has many ecological implications.

1. The monkeys have usually been uprooted from their forests, that are fast disappearing under the benignly neglectful eyes of India's forest authorities which monopolize all forest land. They are being forced out from scrub land by the urban sprawl.

2.With no natural predators,monkey populations are increasing dramatically. And the urban born native monkey is a cunning, fearless and aggressive sophisticate pitching against what it sees as a docile population which owes it a living.

Other urban fauna eg songbirds are getting wiped out, with their eggs and nests under constant attack. Animal welfare activists have tended so far to turn a blind eye to this decimation of birds in Indian towns and cities.
People like feeding monkeys regardless of their religious persuasion, because it feels good and the monkeys are so cute. This causes a further dependence of the monkeys on human populations and the monkeys get extremely aggressive if they are not fed. They will attack the ex-regular beneficiary if s/he fails to turn up with food, snatch food from unwary passersby and even get inside homes, raid the kitchen and the fridge (yes, they are that smart)
Many of the monkeys carry parasites and pathologies that can easily crossover to humans (although this can always work the other way to the detriment of monkeys)

Indians have built laughably few and inadequately designed sanctuaries for monkeys, as for instance, in south Delhi. This 45' high walled structure holds a few hundred monkeys, but only at their will. When they get bored or need a change of diet, they climb over the walls and take off for the nearby villages, only to come back for the night's shelter and free government rations.

In democratic India anything which has even a hint of political incorrectness doesn't even get off the start block. So no one will act on suggestions to neuter the monkeys or send them off to India's eastern states and neighbors who shall be happy to eat them up. Period.

by whitehimalaya at 5:40 AM on 21 Nov 2007

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