A grieving monkey is breaking hearts in an Indian town by refusing to let her dead baby go.

Though the baby died more than a month ago, the mother still walks around carrying the mummified body of her dead baby in Chamaraja Nagar in South India.

The mother monkey, who does not have a hand, carries the carcass in her mouth when she is climbing or running. When she is at rest, she carefully keeps the body next to her.

N. Virupaksha, 55, says the residents of Bramarambha Nagar, where the monkey lives, give her food as she is disabled. “But after the death of her baby she eats very little and looks sad all the time,” he says.

Monkey mothers are known to carry their dead babies but usually drop them after a week.

“It is not unusual for mother monkeys to carry dead babies till they decay and are completely covered with flies,” says Indian wildlife expert Subhendu Mallik.

But a mother monkey carrying mummified remains of the baby is relatively rare.
Dr Sudipta Ranjan Singh, forensic expert at All Indian Institute of Medical Sciences in Bhubaneswar, estimates that the baby would have been dead for more than a month.

“The baby monkey has been mummified due to delayed decomposition process, which in itself a rare phenomenon. Dry and hot environmental conditions acting on a thin body with less water content have caused it,” he says.