Repeated failure of the monkey catching squad has prompted New Delhi Municipal Council to come up with a new technique to overcome the perennial menace in its area. The civic body will equip its employees with Sure Shot guns in VVIP areas like North Block, South Block, Parliament Street and Connaught Place to shoo away the otherwise fearless monkeys.
The NDMC has roped in a company Srijan which would supply these Sure Shot guns to the civic body to curb the simian menace. “The guns will have rubber bullets and function on gas. The gun works in two ways, first it emits a sound loud enough to scare a monkey and second, it fires a rubber bullet. It is totally harmless and will not cause any injury,” said an NDMC official.
A single gun is priced anywhere between Rs 40,000 and Rs 50,000, he added. These guns will be used on a trial basis in VVIP areas like North and South Block and PM’s house to name a few.
From langurs to cages, the agency has tried all methods to manage the problem so far, but to no avail. Despite the ban on their use to scare monkeys, the NDMC continued to deploy langurs in VVIP areas. The civic agency still has around 40 langurs on its rolls. Then it started installing cages with baits to trap the monkeys, but that method failed as the monkeys proved to be too intelligent to fall into this trap. There are around 7,000 monkeys in the area.
“No method has worked for us till date. The monkeys are no longer scared of the langurs. In fact, groups of monkeys used to shoo the langurs away. Then the bait cages were used, but the monkeys just used to eat the food and go. We had to devise a new method, so now we will use the guns,” added the official. The agency gets nearly 50 complaints about the monkeys from various areas like Ram Manohar lohia Hospital and from houses of various political bigwigs.
Following the High Court guidelines, a monkey trapping squad was deployed instead of langurs in the area but no lasting solution has been found. “We have deployed the monkey trapping squad but they can only shoo them away by making loud sounds. But it is just a temporary solution as they promptly come back,” said a senior NDMC officer.
