MONEY-GRUBBING MONKEYS
Businesspeople who deposit large sums of money in banks usually take precautions to prevent robberies. In some parts of India, including the city of Agra, the list of robbery-prevention tips needs to include this: “Watch out for bandits disguised as monkeys—or even actual monkeys!”
Just ask Vijay Bansal, an Agra jeweler, and his daughter, Nancy, who were recently attacked by a gang of monkeys when they went to deposit Rs. 2 lakh at a bank on MG Road.
“My daughter Nancy was holding the bag containing cash,” Bansal told Times of India. “As soon as we reached the first floor of Nath complex to enter the bank, a troop of monkeys sitting on the staircase attacked us. They snatched the bag and climbed to the fourth floor where construction work is going on.”
After a bank guard came to help the Bansals, the monkeys threw down six bundles of Rs. 100 notes, totaling Rs. 60,000, but wouldn’t part with the bundle of Rs. 2,000 notes.
“I even tried offering bread and banana to the troop in an attempt to coax them to return the bag,” Bansal said. “After a while, they threw the bag to the third floor. By the time we reached there, the bag had gone missing again. We alerted the local police who rushed to the spot and joined us in the search. However, we couldn’t trace the bag even after looking for it for more than an hour.”
The police haven’t released a sketch of the suspects, but Agra residents need to be on the lookout for any nouveau-riche monkeys who are throwing money around.
Compiled and partly written by Indian humorist MELVIN DURAI, author of the novel Bala Takes the Plunge.
[Comments? Contributions? We would love to hear from you about Chai Time. If you have contributions, please email us at melvin@melvindurai.com. We welcome jokes, quotes, online clips, and more.]
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