In Hathras, 145 monkey deaths, a ‘cover-up’ & a tip-off

At least 145 monkeys never made it out of the building.

On Friday, veterinary doctors exhumed the bodies of five of the monkeys, who were allegedly buried — surreptitious — and conducted a postmortem.

“The bodies were quite putrefied, so we cannot say anything concrete right now. They most likely died after inhaling poisonous gas, but we’ve collected a few samples and sent them for testing… We expect the results by Saturday,” said one of the doctors.

The godown had sacks containing wheat and rice, ready to be shipped to distributors. The night before the godown’s staff left for the weekend, as per routine, the stacks were covered with tarpaulin and fumigated with an aluminium phosphide solution. Officials suspect the monkeys died after inhaling the gas from aluminium phosphide solution.

On the morning of November 11, labourers saw the bodies scattered across the godown. Circle Officer Yogendra Krishna Narayan said, “We suspect that the tarpaulin, which would keep the gas inside, had a slit which allowed the gas to escape into the room.”

Police got to know about the deaths after Bajrang Dal leader Harshit Gaur filed a complaint, saying that on November 19, he received information from his associate, an employee of the FCI godown, that several monkeys were allegedly being buried there.

Gaur, Bajrang Dal’s Sah Vibhag Sangyojak for Hathras and Mathura, said, “I spoke to an employee of the FCI godown who suspected that the monkeys entered after fumigation of the grains and died. He claimed that the animals were buried inside with full Hindu rituals.”

A case was registered at Kotwali police station under BNS sections 286 (negligent conduct with respect to explosive substances) and 291 (continuance of nuisance after injunction to discontinue). Additionally, provisions of the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals Act have been invoked.

Additional District Magistrate of Hathras, Shiv Narayan Sharma, said an inquiry is underway.

A police officer said, “We asked them (godown employees) why they didn’t go to a magistrate and inform him of the situation… We were told that they were scared locals would be enraged because of the deaths.”

The manager of the godown, Neeraj Sharma, said monkeys were a daily issue. “There’s no way to say how many exactly live in Hathras, but I can say that over a hundred plague the godown daily,” he said. “I feel terrible for what the monkeys went through… they were simply looking out for their survival, for food to eat. How could they know this would happen?”