Published Paper Details:

With the decreasing forest cover the conflict between human and wild animals is always increasing in India. The conflict between the human and Rhesus macaque is also increasing in the city of greater Guwahati, Assam as the species is highly adaptable to man-made habitat. This species Rhesus Macaque Macaca mulatta (Zimmermann, 1780) is listed on CITES Appendix II and least concerned (LC) according to IUCN red list. The present study was carried out during the year 2021-2023 with the primary objectives to find out the human monkey conflict areas in Guwahati City, evaluation of cause of the conflict and perception of the people about the cause. The Study area is located in 26 ?12 ?53.60 ?-26 ?04 ?56.42 ? North latitude and -91 ?53 ?36.31 ?-91 ?34 ?36.18 ? East longitude with an average altitude of 55 meter above mean sea level and covering a geographical area of 216.79 sq km. The study area is densely populated with a human population of 8, 14,575 (as per census 2001). The study involves extensive field visits to the Rhesus monkey habitats in the study area. Activity budgets were done to understand the behaviour of the Rhesus macaque along with the interview of the affected people in the conflict to evaluate their perception. The study concluded that the major human monkey conflict areas in the Guwahati city are the Kamakhya temple, Nabagraha temple, Basistha temple, Maligaon area, Assam State zoo surrounding area, Gauhati University campus along with several other areas. The causes revealed by the people during the period of study were destruction of forest, change of food preferences of the rhesus monkey, availability of easy food from devotees, throwing of remaining food into uncovered areas by the households, population increase of rhesus macaque. As the mitigation measures the perception of people were-removal of the total population of rhesus macaque to the forested areas, provisioning of food plants, discouraging the devotees to provide food for the macaque, plantation to increase the forest area in the study area. In recommendation emphasis should be given to aware the people to the mitigation measures which can be taken up individually by not providing easy food to the monkey, not providing food to these monkeys in the temples etc.