A Halloween Special
Diptanjan S
Purkayastha
Arik Podder
“Dance with the moon in
the dead of night…”
~ Marilyn Manson
“thik dupur bela bhoot e mare dhela”
~Anonymous
You know it’s that time of
the year when the shadows don’t only flutter and flinch, but stretch dark,
liquid fingers, hoping to catch you, hoping to bring you down to them, to draw
you in. You see, baby, it’s Halloween. This is the time when around the world
kids dress up as zombies and vampires or other dark shapes that fascinate them.
Dark shapes that whisper to the night, that are always waiting for us at the
end of the street just around the corner, that have been inhabiting our closets
since our childhood days.
May be in India Halloween’s
not that much of a big thing, but that’s okay I guess, for we have our very own
beliefs in ‘Bhootchaturdashi’. Just
like people abroad have their pack of favorite freaks (Vampires, Werewolves,
Poltergeists, Shape shifters, Zombies and so on), we have our own horde of Goosebumps
as well. And in this article that will surely fetch me the Nobel Prize in
English Literature, I’ll be attempting to tell you about the traditional
Fright-figures of Bengal.
1. Daayan (or Daini) : Now
those of you who have seen Ek Thi Daayan—even
if that film would not have scared you much—I do hope that it revived in you
childhood fairytales in which we get lost in the woods and then are eaten alive
by Daayans (that is, witches). So a daayan is not a unique figure at all—it’s
just the Indian version of those frightening witches that haunt sylvan forests
and cursed, desolate localities. Foul is fair, pals n gals.
p.s. Indian witches don’t
wear hats.
2. Brambhadaitya : Now,
this figure is more interesting. They say, when a ‘Brahmin’ (a sect of people
who wear ‘sacred threads’ around their necks) dies of an accident, a
Brambhadaitya is born. Now, brambhadaityas are traditionally clad in white
clothes. They live on trees and keep an eye on you. And if you keep a foot out
of religious boundaries, well, you’re gonna be in trouble. But if you keep a
brambhadaitya happy, he will give you many good things. I dunno whether he’ll
give you a collector’s edition of Pet
Sematary, but who knows anyway?
3. Pret : Well a Pret is a
ghost of a Hindu man who in his lifetime belonged to a ‘lower class’ in our ‘social
order’. And a Pretini (commonly called Petni) is the female version of a prêt. You
know what they do? When the night is dark and the moon is up and the town is
dead, they come n posses you. Amen.
4. Mamdo : Well this is
the ghost of a Muslim. Just like Prets and Petnis, they are troublesome and are
difficult to get rid off. In case they have you by the neck, you better go to
the Darga of a Pir (Religious Place for people following the Islamic Faith).
5. Nishi : This creature
of the night has always fascinated me. A nishi is a restless female spirit, searching
for a lover. She, as I already said, comes in the Night (Nishi is an alteration
of the word Nisha meaning Night) and calls your name in the voice of someone
you know very well. She has her limitations for she can call only once. Trouble
is, if you respond to her call, you are hypnotized, and then she takes you
wherever she wants to and Christ Jesus knows what she’ll do to you. One thing
for certain: you’ll never return. Boo!
6. Jokh : Mythologically, a
Jokh is a disciple of Kuber—God of Wealth.
But of course there is a
far more frightening story to the origin of a Jokh. You see, ancient rich
people in the ancient ages thought of a rather gruesome (and senseless) way of
protecting their treasures.
step 1: Find an enclosed
place to keep your stuff.
step 2: Find a man and
lock him up with the treasure in this godforsaken place full of gold, devoid of
food.
step 3: This guy will soon
die of boredom, fear, and starvation, and he’ll protect your wealth forever (his
spirit will, that is). Personally, I don’t fancy going into a chamber full of
gold where I might stumble upon a grinning skeleton saying: “welcome, ole pal,
wanna play solitaire wimme?”
Would you take the risk?
7. Aleya : When a human
being is burnt alive, an aleya is born. They say Aleyas are mostly women, There
is another horrific reason behind this belief: The Satidaha Pratha. In India when husbands died, widows were dragged
to their husbands’ funeral pyre, and then they were burnt alive. Many, many
women lost their lives in this unthinkable manner. And that’s why ju-ons were
born. And that’s why they have a grudge against everyone. And so you shall see
fire burning mysteriously if you are wandering into the night in a densely
wooded place. Oddly, an Aleya drags you under water and chokes you to death. Hallelujah.
So that’s it from me, pals
n gals, I have taken enough of your time already. Get going now, give Scooby snacks
to your dog, French fries to your tongue, and watch a horror film.
Just keep watchin your
back and under your bed.
(I repeat, BOO!)
For, you know, Stephen
King said:
“Ghosts are real, and
monsters are real too…”
