Monkey Snatches Newborn From Mother's Lap, Body Found On Neighbor's Terrace

A 12-day-old baby was snatched by a monkey in Agra, a city in northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh late Monday, local media reports said. The newborn was later found mauled on the terrace of a neighbor's house.

According to the family, the newborn was in his mother's lap when the monkey snatched him and escaped. The mother was breastfeeding the baby when the incident took place, local newspaper Hindustan Times reported. The family members chased the monkey but were unable to catch the animal. Later they found the baby lying blood-soaked on a neighbor’s terrace.

The infant was rushed to a hospital where the doctors declared him brought dead, the family members said.

"The main door of the house was open and my wife was breastfeeding out son. A monkey barged into our house and grabbed my baby's neck with its mouth and fled," the victim's father who was identified by only his first name, Yogesh, told local daily Times of India. "He was my only child. I never expected his life to end like this."

Residents said minutes before attacking the newborn, the monkey had attacked a 14-year-old girl nearby. The girl managed to escape with minor injuries.

A police officer said the newborn's body had been sent for an autopsy and would be handed over to the family.

In India, monkey menace has created a lot of problems, mostly because of their aggressive behavior.

“People do not dare to go to their terraces. Those who do, have sealed their homes with iron mesh cages. You cannot leave your door open or sit in the sun,” a resident of Vijay Nagar colony Seema Gupta told local media.

A similar incident took place in April when a two-week-old infant was allegedly snatched by a monkey in Cuttack, Odisha, in India. Police searched for the baby for 24 hours and later found the child's body inside a well near his house.

“The monkey took the baby from inside a mosquito net. It [the monkey] was spotted by Sarojini [the child’s mother], who immediately had raised an alarm, but the creature jumped over the roof and disappeared from her view,” child's aunt Rajnandini Nayak told reporters at the time.

In another incident in August, a monkey entered a home in a remote village in Karnataka, India, and tried to “steal” a newborn baby. The primate pinned the newborn baby to the floor and attacked villagers who came close to it. After several attempts, a man managed to snatch the newborn up from underneath the animal and to safety.