Mumbai: People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) India and 30 other wildlife and animal welfare advocacy organisations demanded the Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (MoEF&CC) to reinstate the legal protections for Rhesus Macaques breed of monkeys and to grant them the highest protection.

The joint letter, written on Wednesday, pointed out that the protections for Rhesus Macaques, which were removed in 2022 after being in place for 50 years, would prevent the animals from being killed or captured for the experimentation, meat, or pet industries.

It also stressed that, without the protections, the management of these animals now falls to municipal corporations or law enforcement agencies instead of forest officials, which do not have the expertise, training, or resources required to manage wildlife.

The letter claimed that the absence of official safeguards also leaves rhesus macaques vulnerable to exploiters who will force them back into street performances, which have been outlawed since 1998. Rhesus macaques are now also at risk of abduction from their natural habitats, sale into the illegal pet trade, exploitation for social media content, experiments, and even slaughter for meat.

A recent report by World Animal Protection revealed that monkeys kept as pets endure abuse for online videos including beatings, burns, and amputations to elicit reactions, all while suffering loneliness, confinement, and eventual abandonment.

Dr Anjana Aggarwal, PETA India Science Policy Advisor, said, “This regressive shift not only erases years of progress in protecting rhesus macaques, it also leaves them vulnerable to horrific cruelty and exploitation. Stripping rhesus macaques of vital protections is a travesty, and this joint letter is the latest effort in PETA India’s campaign to amplify pressure on decision-makers to rectify it.”

Distinctly social beings, rhesus macaques thrive in large, active groups, are nursed by their mothers for up to one year and love to climb and swim. In addition to being revered in Hinduism, they fulfil an important role in local ecosystems by dispersing seeds due to their frequent consumption of fruit and their absence can be detrimental to forests, said PETA India.

In the experimentation industry, which is already bleeding forests dry of rhesus macaques in Asia, monkeys are stolen from the wild, crammed into small wooden crates, and transported in the dark, terrifying cargo holds of planes for as long as 30 hours. The stress of capture and transportation can weaken their immune systems, increasing the risk of spreading zoonotic diseases in India and around the world. In laboratories, monkeys are typically confined to small metal cages and tormented in experiments in which they’re cut open, poisoned, crippled, forced to become addicted to drugs, electroshocked, and killed, said PETA India.