Giving a positive twist to the lockdown, hundreds of monkeys that used to throng the Thenmala-Kulathupuzha road and nearby areas have retreated to the nearby forest offering the farmers a respite from their menace.
With the popular tourism destination switching to lockdown mode, the monkey troops started slowly disappearing from the premises, mainly owing to the lack of food. According to residents, while wild animals are still seen exploring empty streets, there has been a considerable dip in the number of monkeys, that too at a time when they were expecting the worst.
“They used to raid our farms and houses for food, leaving all fruit-bearing trees completely ravaged. In the initial days of the lockdown, we expected the monkey menace to peak and this time we were overly worried owing to the monkey fever reports. Sometimes they arrive in large groups, destroying the crops and attacking people. I would not say they have completely vanished, but now there are no regular incidents and we are greatly relieved,” says Sheena, a homemaker from Kulathupuzha.
The monkeys were mainly dependent on the food scraps offered by tourists and other leftovers, but of late there had been none. During the lockdown some voluntary organisations came forward offering food, but the forest authorities discouraged them, slowly driving the monkeys back to where they belong.
“It is one main change we noticed during lockdown,” says B. Sajeev Kumar, Wildlife Warden, Shendurney Wildlife Sanctuary. During the pre-lockdown days, motorists could spot several troops on the Thenmala-Kulathupuzha road, all of them fed by tourists and passers-by. “As of now, we cannot say that they will not return as they have developed this habit of getting fed by tourists. But it’s better for both monkeys and the farmers if they remained in the forest,” he adds.
Attempts in vain
Over the years, farmers have tried several methods to stop the monkey menace, but a 24-day lockdown seems to have done the trick. “Our grama panchayat comes in the forest area with an excessive presence of monkeys in several parts. We had many of them living on the premises of our panchayat office, but currently more than 50% of them have gone back to the forest. Earlier, many houses could not keep their doors or windows open because of the threat and now the situation has changed at least in some parts,” says R. Lailaja, president, Thenmala grama panchayat.
She adds that it is not just monkey menace the villagers are facing since all kinds of wild animals frequent the place. “Domestic animals go missing from the village and even last week there was an incident. Apart from monkeys, it is wild boars and giant squirrels that cause maximum damage to the crops,” she says.
