Over the past few weeks I’ve caught occasional news blurbs about the ongoing preparations for the 2010 Delhi Commonwealth Games, which are slated to start on October 3.

If you believed in curses, you might suspect that someone had hexed the games.

The worst of the incidents—so far—has been the collapse of a foot bridge last week, which injured 27 people. But the complete list of mishaps is daunting. (It contains everything from Dengue Fever to shooting rampages.)

Fortunately, the organizers have a solution to at least one of the most pressing problems: They’ve deployed trained langur monkeys to protect the athletes.

When I read the headline in an email this morning, I was certain my friend Tom (aka., The Blogfodder) was pulling my leg. After all, I’d fallen for the mother of all practical jokes just yesterday.

But no, the news item was legit. Apparently they’re having a big problem with wild animals infiltrating the athletes’ village. One (probably shocked and terrified) competitor found a cobra in his room.

And that’s not all. According to the article,

Commonwealth Games organisers have also been particularly concerned by the arrival of packs of wild monkeys which have been creating a nuisance around the venues by stealing food and attacking humans.

I guess you could call it a case of fighting fire with fire—or monkeys with monkeys, as the case may be.