Monkey threat facing India's WiFi revolution

Nestled on the banks of the river Ganges, India's northern temple town of Varanasi is in the grip of a monkey crisis.

The city, also Prime Minister Narendra Modi's constituency, receives a large number of tourists every day, both domestic and foreign, due to its religious significance.

But the holy town is grappling with frequent breakdown of internet services caused by monkeys biting through the wires.

"I am trying to get WiFi, but I could not get it, so it is like hard to get WiFi. I really want to text my mom and text my sister. That is a problem I am facing," said Melisa, a tourist from Holland on 3 April.

The monkeys in Varanasi are seen as an avatar of the Hindu monkey god Hanuman and are considered sacred. Chasing away or trapping the monkeys will outrage residents and temple-goers.

The city of over 2 million people is impossibly crowded and laying underground cables everywhere is out of the question.

A senior engineer with Telecommunication Department, A.P Srivastav, says there are plans to lay some optical cable underground to deal with the situation.

"There is an immense monkey menace. They bite the wires and the signal gets disrupted. It happens very often. We have laid down optical cable underground till the banks which has resolved half the problem, but at this point of time it is not possible to do so everywhere across the banks. So, we take it above head and also deal with monkeys," said Srivastav.

A pipeline around the banks to lay down wires is also an option the department is considering.

The local administration provides free WiFi service to the locals and tourists around the Ganga banks.