Babban's Diary
Shahdara Railway Colony
1700 Hours
17th July 2015
It was a long day by my standards. At this age I want to stay away from these streaks of activism but young boys in my clan do not allow me to give up. Felt like a leader again today jumping in close proximity to the corridors of power. We all gathered at the Banyan tree near Jantar Mantar to discuss and raise our voice against joblessness an continuing poverty of our people since the new government took over. We are the Langurs of Delhi who are now being replaced by human jokers hired by the New Delhi Municipal Corporation to imitate us. The speakers in today's meeting were particularly angry at the audacity of a central minister to announce it in the Parliament some months ago that we would now be rendered jobless and unemployed boys will mimic us and scare away the monkeys and stray dogs. Jagat Singh from Mayapuri who is retired from Udyog Bhawan after his 20 years service had a completely different take to deal with this crisis. A bit fierce though. He wanted all of us to march to the union minister's home to feed on the Andhra cuisines and create ruckus there. It took a lot of effort for me and some others to restrain him and his bunch.
It has been resolved in today's meeting to convey it in clear terms to our fellow dogs and monkeys not be scared by the new recruit jokers and be rest assured that we are now out of job and will not harm them. A separate committee has also been formed to dig deep into the fact that it was not the dogs, Monkeys, Langurs or for that matter any other wild animals that are intruding into the human space. It was infact, the humans who have trespassed into our areas and have build high rise buildings and parliament houses.
It has been widely accepted by our fellows in the meeting that two things have severely damaged our livelihood prospects. The death of the deputy mayor falling from terrace and the coming to power of a minister who brands herself as a protector of animal rights. Both the reasons are invalid and worth not even a laugh. Death had to do with the lose balance of the body and the influence of the lady minister has to do with the balance of power.
In the coming session of Parliament, one may witness young unsuspecting men playing Langurs outside the Parliament complex and around he ministry buildings. Why just outside, going by the standards on human public life, i see many men and women imitating like us inside the Parliament as well on roads. Last week, a well educated lady pounced upon a poor policeman and slapped him because he was doing his duty honestly.
While we dispersed with a decision to meet again like the humans do, some youngsters have a strange way of looking at this change in time. If men can imitate us and grab our jobs, why cant we imitate them and take over some of their jobs as well. All I had to say was that Protect Wildlife was a far cry for human beings, they should protect themselves first. We should be best left to ourselves. They better don't try to mend our ways. Ask them to not feed us biscuits and bananas, we can fetch them enough wild fruits if they pay us for that.
Photo: Appeared as part of story in qz.com and credited to AP photos/Gurinder Osan
