A black-faced langur has been roaming the Char Sonamukhi area of Shariatpur for two days. Villagers are handing the animal, which came in search of food, bananas, biscuits and other fruit. When it has finished eating, it climbs back into the trees.

Locals first saw the langur on Monday 9 October in a banyan tree at Dariya Bari in Char Sonamukhi, Rudrakar union, Sadar upazila. At dawn on Tuesday 10 October it was seen sitting in front of Binoy Dariya's house in search of food. After locals fed it, the animal moved elsewhere.

Duranta Majumder, a local college student, said he had seen the langur sitting on a branch of a banyan tree the day before. At dawn today it turned up in front of his house. He, his mother and his aunt went up to it and handed it bananas, biscuits and cucumber, and the langur calmly took the food from everyone's hands and ate it.

NGO worker Beauty Rani Mondal said: "At dawn I heard people shouting, went over and saw a huge langur sitting there. I then brought a cucumber from the house and put it in its hand."

Manju Rani, a housewife, said: "I was scared when I first saw the langur. Then I felt very bad seeing it eat tree bark out of hunger, so I brought a banana from the house for it. It took the banana from my hand nicely and started eating. When it finished, it ran off to the west of the village."

Jyoti Bikash Chandra, the Sadar upazila nirbahi officer (UNO), said the langur may have come from another district on a banana truck. If it does not find food, it will move on elsewhere. He said the administration would speak to the forest department about the langur causing harm or nuisance to people, and would send people to catch it.

Source: Jagonews24. First published in Bengali on The Agro News.