Court asks Delhi civic bodies to get monkeys off city streets
INDIA: A top court reprimanded civic authorities in the Indian
capital for not doing enough to stop hundreds of monkeys in the city
from terrifying residents, news reports said Thursday.
As forest cover around the area has shrunk, the city has struggled
with a growing simian population. Government buildings, temples and many
residential neighborhoods of New Delhi are overrun by hundreds of Rhesus
macaques. They will occasionally snatch food from unsuspecting
passers-by and even bite them.
"If you can't control the monkeys, what can you do?" the Delhi High
Court asked representatives of the various municipal authorities, the
reports said.
The court was acting on a petition filed by the harassed residents of
a posh residential neighborhood.
City authorities weren't immediately available for comment.
Over the years city authorities have tried all sorts of innovative
methods to deal with the problem. They've recruited langurs - a larger
and fiercer kind of simian - to scare or catch the macaques.
Earlier this year the country's Supreme Court ordered wildlife
authorities to transport some 300 macaques from New Delhi to the dense
jungles of Madhya Pradesh state.
The Madhya Pradesh government was to receive 2.5 million rupees
(US$54,000) from the federal government to cover the cost of
reintroducing the monkeys to the wild.
NEW DELHI, Thursday, AP
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