Month on, paralyzed monkey to take leap back into the wild

MUMBAI: A month after a “severely“ injured monkey had been rescued from Chembur, it has had a miraculous recovery and is all set to be released into the wild.
The young monkey was unable to use its body below the shoulder. Nearly paralyzed, it had been rehabilitated at the Thane Society for Prevention of Cruelty to Animals (SPCA) since its rescue on March 27.“Now, the monkey is prancing on all fours. It should be released in a day or two,“ said Pawan Sharma, president of Resquink Association for Wildlfe Welfare. “But earlier, we feared that this monkey would be permanently immobile and it would have to be confined permanently to a rehabilitation home.“ While animal activists are happy about the 180-deg ree turn that this simian has shown, they expressed concern over the rising number of monkeys needing rescue and the lack of space to rehabilitate them.
TOI, in its April 28 edition, reported about a group of monkeys wreaking havoc in Bandra. Only recently TOI carried a report about a monkey which had suffered an electric shock and was rescued from Thane and released into the wild after treatment.
“The issue only gets bigger. There is an urgent need for a rescue transit facility for wild animals and birds in and around Mumbai,“ said Sharma, adding that monkeys need huge cages with a wooded ambience within.
Most of the monkeys rescued in and around Thane are treated at SPCA. President of Thane SPCA, Shakuntala Majumdar, said that the issue of a transit rehabilitation facility for wild animals and birds has been in limbo for almost three years. “There has been no progress on this so far. I've been working with the state forest department on this issue of rehabilitation of wild animals since 2006. We have never asked the department for reimbursement ever,“ said Majumdar.
Range forest officer (Thane) Ichchant Kambli said the modalities of the plan are being worked out. “The paperwork for the land at Shilphata has begun,“ he said.