For ‘ghost barber’ victims, panic wins over logic
BAREILLY: Rehnuma Khan, 12, a student of Class 4, was sleeping on a bed in a cramped room of her house in Subhash Nagar area of Bareilly. Her brother Yusuf, 8, was sleeping beside her while her mother and other siblings occupied two other cots. There were seven people in the room but no one is sure as to when Rehnuma’s hair was chopped off.
“Meri bitiya subah-subah apne baal dekh ke rone lagi. Kisi cheez ne uske baal kaat diye (My granddaughter started crying after seeing her chopped hair. Something cut her hair),” said Kaisar Jahan, 62 years old.
The incident that took place on August 3 was the first case of mysterious hair-chopping in Braj and Rohilkhand. Five other cases came to light on the same day. In all, women found their braids chopped off mysteriously and some of them also fell ill.
In Mojampur village of Badaun, about 80km from Bareilly, a woman, 32-year-old Somwati, had to be hospitalised after her braid was cut. The incident took place at 11am on Thursday. After finding her hair chopped off, Somwati fainted and was rushed to the community health centre.
In another case, Tabassum, 22, a resident of Bisauli town in Badaun, was sitting alone in a room on Thursday when she realised that a part of her braid had been chopped off. “When I turned around, I saw a cat sitting near my hair. She disappeared as soon as my mother entered the room,” Tabassum said. She complained of uneasiness and nausea after the incident and was admitted to a private hospital.
Initially, local police did not play attention to these incidents but when the news reached Lucknow, teams rushed to the affected areas to take stock of the situation and collect evidence. The mass hysteria soon grabbed media attention.
“After the incident in our village, we didn’t sleep all night. Everyone prayed to Allah for the safety of women and children,” said Mohd Munaf Raza Khan, a resident of Mojampur village.
Apart from prayers, villagers have started using other means to protect themselves. They dip their palms in turmeric and leave its impression at the entrance of their houses to ward off evil. In the absence of turmeric, people use henna, black paint or soil. Some have fixed twigs of neem on doors while others have put green chillies, lemon, garlic and onion in their houses.
The more cautious ones apply ‘mahawar’ or ‘aalta’ (red dye) on their hands and feet. Women have started tying their hair in tight buns and covering it with ‘dupattas’.
Residents of Banna Devi area of Aligarh, 132km from Bisauli in Badaun, have also adopted various means to save themselves after a teenage girl’s hair was chopped off on Thursday.
Reena Kumar, 16, a resident of Illiaspur locality near Aligarh, was alone at home when she found a bunch of hair near her feet. “I don’t remember much as I was terrified,” she said when asked how she could identify her hair in the dark.
“She is just a child, how much can she remember,” said her elder brother. He added people were terrified after the incident.
Ironically, mass hysteria rules the roost in the region where the incidents have done maximum damage. Barely 110 km away from Aligarh, an elderly woman was lynched by a group, which branded her a witch on the suspicion that she was involved in hair-chopping incidents.
The post-mortem report mentioned myocardial infarction (heart attack) due to physical shock as cause of her death. Police charged two men with murder and arrested one of them.
“She (Maan Devi) belonged to Jatav community and her attackers were Baghels. Her death has pitched people of one community against others,” said Sumesh Singh, a village panchayat member. “Bhoot ke chakkar main gaon main ek ko bhoot bana diya. Isse bura kya hoga,” he rued.