Monkeys may swing elections, but Delhi doesn't want them

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From ANIMAL PEOPLE, June 2007:

 

 

Monkeys may swing elections, but Delhi doesn't want them

 

DELHI-- " Marauding monkeys and the chaos they spread across

New Delhi " were " an important issue " in the April 2007 municipal

elections, reported Rahul Bedi of The Daily Telegraph.

But the outcome for monkeys was not apparent in the election

results, because no party really seems to have a politically viable

and popular solution.

Members of the Congress Party most flamboyantly campaigned against

" the monkey menace. " The Congress Party recommended raising a

" monkey army " of chained languors, to roust the smaller and much

more abundant rhesus macaques who cause most of the monkey trouble.

Indeed, chained languors are at times employed successfully

to guard specific locations for limited times--but apart from the

humane issues involved in capturing and training them, they are

often the losers when troupes of macaques gang up and counter-attack.

Few politicians other than former federal minister for animal

welfare Maneka Gandhi advocate leaving street dogs alone, to chase

off monkeys as they have for centuries. But several Delhi citizens

gave testimony to Bedi suggesting that urbanized macaques have become

a much bigger threat than street dogs ever were, except possibly in

potential for carrying rabies, and macaques can transmit rabies too,

if infected.

" Bands of monkeys routinely lay siege to our house, forcing

us to keep the doors locked and to remain vigilant at all times, "

testified Perminder Kaur of west Delhi.

Added fellow Delhi resident Shakuntla Devi, " If even one

monkey manages to get inside, it takes hours to get rid of him.

They often bite children and create untold damage. "

Wrote Bedi, " Efforts by Delhi's municipality to rid the city

of the destructive animals are hampered by the majority Hindu

religious sentiment that associates monkeys with the god Hanuman,

who helped Lord Rama defeat Ravana, the evil king who reigned over

what is now Sri Lanka. Novel methods of chasing them away with ultra

high frequency loudspeakers, deporting them to neighboring states,

or transporting them to India's only monkey jail in Patiala, 200

miles north of Delhi, too have failed. Nobody wants Delhi's

monkeys: they have enough of their own.

" For nearly five decades, " Bedi continued, " monkeys have

also held sway in New Delhi's corridors of power, " including the

buildings that " house, amongst others, the prime minister's office

and the defense, finance, and home ministries. Tough wire meshing

stretches across the windows of the Indian army chief's office to

protect the head of the world's third largest and nuclear-armed

military from monkeys. "

Bedi did not mention that the Delhi monkey problem began with

efforts to remove street dogs from the then newly designated national

capital. But the Delhi street dog and monkey issues have often been

linked, albeit without recognition that they are not just parallel

but related.

The Delhi High Court, for instance, recommended in 2002

that the city " shall eradicate or at least minimize the problem of

stray dogs, stray cattle, and monkeys. "

Roundups of dogs and cattle followed, leaving the Delhi food

sources more accessible to the monkeys, who proved much harder to

capture.

On February 21, 2007 the Delhi High Court gave the city 10

days to start trapping monkeys and relocating them to the Asola

wildlife sanctuary in South Delhi, and " directed the government to

build a steep wall around the place in the sanctuary where the

monkeys would be shifted, to prevent them from returning to the

city, " The Hindu reported.

The orders came one week after the monkey business was

returned to the High Court from the Supreme Court of India, which

declined responsibility for deciding what to do with the

fast-expanding urban monkey population.

Like raccoons, the North American native mammal occupying

the most similar habitat niche, monkeys tend to gather in greater

numbers where food is abundant. Thus both monkeys and raccoons live

at concentrations up to 50 times greater in urban areas with adequate

sleeping trees than in their native forest habitat.

This in turn thwarts relocation schemes.

" In accordance with directions issued by the Supreme Court in

April 2004, " summarized The Hindu, " the Madhya Pradesh government

accepted 250 monkeys from the Delhi government. Subsequently, in

October 2006, the Supreme Court gave further direction that 300 more

monkeys kept in Delhi be translocated to Madhya Pradesh. Annoyed at

this order, the Madhya Pradesh government filed an affidavit

expressing its inability to accept the 300 monkeys, as its forests

were already overcrowded with the monkeys received in 2004. "

Five other states in northern India have also refused to

accept the Delhi monkeys.

That left Delhi chief monkey catcher Nand Lal no option but

to keep the monkeys he caught in " an overcrowded shed on the

outskirts of the city, which animal charities have described as a

'monkey prison,' " summarized Main Ridge of the South China Morning

Post.

Frustrated and catching flak from all sides, after holding many of

the monkeys for more than a year, Lal quit.

Still unresolved are years of litigation by Common Cause

attorney Meira Bhatia, leading efforts to banish the monkeys, and a

case filed by Friendicoes SECA founder Geeta Sheshmani, seeking to

expedite the monkeys' release into natural habitat.

--Merritt Clifton

 

 

 

--

Merritt Clifton

Editor, ANIMAL PEOPLE

P.O. Box 960

Clinton, WA 98236

 

Telephone: 360-579-2505

Fax: 360-579-2575

E-mail: anmlpepl

Web: www.animalpeoplenews.org

 

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