What to do about Vrindavan's "monkey menace"?

One of the consequences of the destruction of forest in Vrindavan is the increased infestation of monkeys in the urban area. Whether there is a relationship between the recent chopping down of more than 1500 full sized trees in two highway widening schemes and the increase in monkey (rhesus macaque) problems in the town cannot be stated, but there is no doubt that the problem has increasingly been coming to the fore, with regular reports in the local press of various incidents.

The streets are narrow, the monkeys are adept at snatching things and have become emboldened in the past few years. Whereas only certain parts of the town were danger zones even a few years ago, now one has to pay attention almost everywhere in the central part of town.

Horror stories abound. Just a few minutes' conversation with anyone will reveal numerous accounts of dangerous encounters with the animals--monkey pushing or frightening people so that they fall from rooftops, spontaneously biting people severely, even in open public places like Seva Kunj. And if one goes with a monkey bite to the hospital, he must now be checked and inoculated not just for rabies, but for HIV also.

Problems in Vrindavan are rife, an rapid urbanization and tourism are the principal reasons for the general environmental degradation. But the people see the monkey problem as one that needs immediate resolution.

It is clear that this problem is not confined to Vrindavan alone. Several major cities like Delhi and Jaipur are affected by the "monkey menace." Recent elections in Uttarakhand saw the inclusion of monkey control as part of the election manifesto of major political parties for the first time. In particular, though, Himachal Pradesh has been in the forefront in India of responding to the difficulty.

In November 2003, the Himachal Pradesh High Court, in response to public interest litigation (PIL), criticized the state government for not doing enough to contain the monkey “menace.” This led to the state's forest department and MOEF submitting the ‘Action Plan to Tackle the Monkey Menace in Shimla and Shimla Kalka Highway'.

This led to another PIL on the national level in the Supreme Court in April 2004, and the federal ministry's submission of a “National Action Plan for Controlling [the] Stray Animal Menace (monkeys, dogs, cattle and pigs).” As this PIL was related to the Himachal Pradesh situation, the federal plan seems to have been a hastily cobbled together copy of the state plan. Furthermore, though the HP action plan has resulted in action, little evidence is there that the federal initiative has gone anywhere.

So what to do? On the whole, there seem to be three solutions: culling or killing the critters, translocating them, or sterilization.

(1) Culling is not really an option. It would go against the wishes of most people living here. Besides the fact that there is a deep-seated idea of Hanuman as a sacred creature, Hindus in general are not in favor of killing. A poll in Himachal Pradesh showed that only 24% of people were in favour of this solution in their area.

Watching the beauty of these monkey's jumping and playing, it is hard not to admire the workings of nature in them, despite their rather unpleasant character. It is hard to blame them for their situation, which is the result of human depradations more than anything else.

(2) Translocation. This simply moves the problem elsewhere, and besides there is no nearby habitat to which monkeys could reasonably be sent.

This was the first solution attempted in Shimla after the abovementioned PIL. About 3,400 monkeys were translocated from various troublespots to rural areas. But not long afterward, in December 2006, about 9,000 farmers took to the streets to protest that the urban monkeys were damaging their crops.

Animal rights activists complained that the monkeys were being mindlessly shifted to unsuitable habitat areas. As Sujoy Chaudhuri, a environmental and wildlife activist writes:

Despite giving the appearance of performing an animal welfare service by “giving them a second chance,” translocation, in the words of Wolfgang Dittus, a primatologist with the Smithsonian Institute, "is a political solution, not a biological one: it is a coward's way of killing the animals” because survival rates among translocated animals is extremely low. (Monkey relocation plan: Urban Bias? Sujoy Chaudhuri (Indian Environmental Portal))

Other concerns are the urban monkeys could spread their diseases to the wild monkeys living in the forests, some of which are rare and even endangered species.

Wildlife conservationists also feel that there is an urban bias in translocation plans, which define the problem only in terms of biting, harassment and the destruction of property in cities. Unless rural populations are favorably disposed to preserving wildlife, it will be an impossibility, and the problems created by crop raiding, etc., by moving monkeys to rural areas will erode any positive feelings rural people have for wildlife.

In the specific circumstances of Vrindavan, it would be hard to assess where the monkeys could be sent in any case as there are no reasonably nearby forested areas to speak of.

(3) Sterilization, which seems to be the only other option, has been tested in several places, but the full consequences or success or failure of the programs are not yet known.

After the failure of the translocation scheme in HP, the government went on a war footing in January 2008 in a fairly widely publicized sterilization effort. Rs. 8.3 million was set aside for the job. The wildlife department purchased two laser sterilization machines, and the plan was for a mobile van to go around Shimla in search of dominant male monkeys to sterilize them on the spot, inside the vehicle. It was also sold as an employment scheme.

A more recent article from June 27, 2009, (Himachal Pradesh sterilizes monkeys to check their population) indicates that the HP forest department is continuing with the sterilization program. They claim to that they have deployed a team of doctors (I assume veterinarians) to sterilize around 5,000 monkeys and have a target of sterilizing another 75,000 monkeys over the next 2-3 years. (According to another source, there are approximately 300,000 monkeys altogether in HP.)

"This year we are targeting to sterilize 20,000 monkeys. Next year we will target to sterilize 25,000 monkeys. We believe that in next 2-3 years, we will be able to sterilize around 75,000 monkeys. It will bring a meaningful difference if we achieve this target," said J.P Nadda, Forest Minister, Himachal Pradesh.

The department is adopting laser therapy to sterilize monkeys, which they consider to be more effective than other techniques available for sterilization. Authorities have strictly banned feeding of the brown, rhesus monkeys - a favourite pastime of most tourists.

"In zoos of Germany and some other European countries, the sterilization process involves placing a chip in monkeys. The chip has to be placed every three years. There are some other techniques for sterilization too but they are effective for short term. Our sterilization method is for life long," said Dr. Sandeep, an expert in monkey sterilization.

A similar sterilization program is apparently underway in Lobpuri, a temple town in Thailand with a tourist industry and a similar macaque problem. According to the report,

Every day, a team of vets marches into alleyways, armed with candy bags to tempt the monkeys, who are then captured and operated on. At least half of the 1,500 male macaques are expected to be sterilized as part of the program. Male monkeys can mate 10 times a day and females can give birth twice a year. The sterilization procedure takes around half an hour. The monkeys are released back into their concrete jungle the next day, after they have recovered.

Environmentalists and wildlife experts like Sujoy Chaudhuri and Belinda Wright, the director of the Wildlife Protection Society of India, have offered objections which center on inadequate training of the sterilizers, as the sterilizing equipment “requires a huge amount of expertise.” They expressed fears that it would do nothing to contain the problem and probably make it worse. “Can you imagine what having badly-sterilized monkeys running around will do to the levels of aggression?"

In the above cited article from Indian Environmental Portal, Chaudhuri clarifies this objection:

Astonishingly, the national plan suggests that male sterilisations be conducted to control the conflict. Because monkeys are polygynous (females mate with many males), it is females that need to be targeted for sterilisation. The national plan, however, claims that the sterilisation of males makes greater economic sense because there are apparently fewer males. Anyway, sterilisation is a long-term population stabilisation measure and can do little to contain the immediate conflict: sterilised monkeys can bite as hard as non-sterilised ones, and can raid crop fields with equal ease.

According to a survey of public opinion (PDF) published in February this year, regarding sterilization conducted in Himachal Pradesh, there was strong favorability to sterilization as the best solution to the problem.

The summary of that survey: 75% were favorable to sterilization, 90% agreed to a feeding ban. Other solutions such as patrolling by dogs, better control of waste, etc., were not deemed viable by the majority. But 90% agreed that government should do something.

This recent article states that Simla now has 800 monkeys in what is a much larger town than Vrindavan. I would not hesitate to estimate the monkey population here to be in excess of 800. But judging from the data gathered in the various articles, 800 already represents a considerable reduction from the numbers that were present at the beginning of the project.

I have written to the Himachal Pradesh government asking for further information about their monkey sterilization project and to the environmentalists who spoke out against it for further information.