Outside Nirman Bhawan, which houses the babus of the urban development ministry, a young man dressed in green pants and a beige T-shirt, with a slingshot in hand, is busy chasing monkeys away. He spots a monkey barely 20 feet away from where he's standing. It is perched on a tree, and scampers at the sight of the man. Another monkey remains unfazed of the man's malevolent gaze. For it, the man pulls out a slingshot from his back pocket and fires a perfect shot - a rubber pellet - which hits it near the eye. The monkey screeches and hurriedly runs for cover.
Meet 26-year-old Mahendra Nath, a professional monkey chaser and one of the 40 men entrusted with the task of controlling the monkey menace in New Delhi's VVIP area by the New Delhi Municipal Council (NDMC). Nath keeps the monkeys at bay by imitating the sounds made by a langur, a creature that monkeys are petrified of. His other paraphernalia includes a slingshot and a stick, both provided to him by NDMC. Until February 2013, the local authorities used langurs to scare the monkeys away. Langurs roaming around government offices along with their handlers were a common sight not so long ago. Nath too owned two langurs and was often called to chase the monkeys away. But, an amendment to the Wildlife Protection Act 1972 meant that the langurs became a protected species and could no longer be owned, sold or hired out.
There is no stopping the monkeys now. Thousands exist in every part of the city. A large army lives in the Lutyens' Zone: outside Parliament House, North and South Blocks and the various red sandstone buildings built for the babudom. Rapid urbanisation, along with the dwindling forest cover, has meant that monkey rehabilitation has become a major problem for the city.
A native of Agra, Nath came to Delhi in search of work in 2007 and settled down in the slums of Faridabad. When nothing worked out, Nath bought two langurs from NDMC and became a part of the monkey-tackling force in the city. "I have been scaring away monkeys for a very long time. The only difference now is that I use langur noises instead of actual langurs," he says. Ask him if he's scared of getting bitten by a monkey and Nath answers with an effulgent smile. "I'm not afraid of them at all. Most of the monkeys in this area recognise me. They don't even dare to come near me." Due to the precarious job he does, Nath gets a vaccination shot twice every year, eradicating any fear of rabies. However, Nath, who is employed through a contractor, is dissatisfied with the Rs 6,000 he is paid a month. "We keep government officials safe. I work six days a week. Yet, we are not paid enough," he says dejectedly.
Apart from possessing the exceptional talent of imitating langur noises and being a crack shot with his catapult, Nath is a keen observer of Indian politics. He expresses his views about the country's state of affairs eloquently. A fierce critic of Natwar Singh, he says that nobody cares about him now. "By making such stunning revelations in his book, he just wants to be back in the limelight." When asked about Maneka Gandhi, he is quick to express his relief over the government's decision to appoint Prakash Javedekar as environment minister instead of her. "She only cares about animals, not people," he says.
