- Recently,Assam’s Bongaigaon district authorities has launched a project under the MGNREGA to plant guava, mango, blackberry and other fruit trees to ensure that the resident golden langurs of the Kakoijana Reserve Forest do not have to risk their lives to find food.
- This project was launched after several golden langurs had died due to electrocution and in road accidents while looking for food beyond the reserve forests.
- Further,this will be the first time when Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act(MGNREGA) will have non-human beneficiaries.
- Golden langur is a leaf-eating monkey found only in northeastern India and Bhutan.It is currently marked endangered in the IUCN list.
- It inhabits evergreen and deciduous tropical forests.Like most fruit eating primates they play a vital role in forest repopulation such as seed dispersal, seed predation and pollination.
- The main reason for low numbers of golden langurs is because of their localized habitat and the rapid loss of this habitat due to deforestation.
- Chakrashila is India’s first wildlife sanctuary with golden langur as the primary species. Chakrashila has about 600 golden langurs whose population is scattered across western Assam and the foothills of Bhutan.
- Mahatma Gandhi National Rural Employment Guarantee Act (MGNREGA) is the largest social security scheme in the world that guarantees 100 days of unskilled manual work to all rural households in India.
Golden langur to get fruits of MGNREGA
8 min read