Monkey snatches and kills newborn baby in India

Animal entered house and took 12-day-old infant from mother's lap

In many areas of India monkeys and humans live in close proximity and attacks are relatively common (Getty)

A 12-day-old baby has died after he was snatched from his mother’s arms by a monkey in the Indian state of Uttar Pradesh.

Neighbours rushed to help after they heard the woman’s screams, and threw stones in an effort to scare the monkey into releasing the infant in a village north of Agra.

The baby’s father, an auto-rickshaw driver who gave his name as Yogesh, told the Times of India: “The main door of the house was open and my wife was breastfeeding our son. Suddenly a monkey barged inside our house and grabbed the child by the neck.”

“Before [we] could understand anything, the monkey took away our son. After a chase the monkey left our son on a neighbour’s roof, but it was too late. [He] was heavily bleeding and had no pulse. We took him to a nearby hospital but he was declared dead.”

The baby was the only child of the couple, who have been married for two years.

“They threw stones at the monkey to force it to drop the baby but by the time he abandoned it, he had already attacked him severely on the face,” Agra Police Assistant Superintendent Abhishek told CNN.

The baby’s body was recovered from the roof of a neighbouring property.

Police said the injuries indicated the child had been bitten on the face.

A police official told the Times of India: “The victim’s body has been sent for post-mortem and will be handed over to the family soon. The child’s skull and neck suffered grave injuries – we saw the open wounds.”

Local residents told reporters that 15 minutes before the baby was snatched, the same monkey had attacked a 14-year-old girl who sustained minor injuries before escaping.

Monkey bites are the second most common attacks by animals in India, after dogs.

According to the Delhi government, 268 cases of monkey bites were recorded by authorities in the capital in 2016.

The city is home to thousands of Rhesus Macaque monkeys. They often break into houses, steal food and spread rubbish around.

In 2007 a former deputy mayor of Delhi, Sawinder Singh Bajwa, fell to his death from a balcony after overbalancing while being attacked by monkeys.