Chintu And Cannibals

It was a beautiful village. It was green and situated by a beautiful river. The village was happy. People were very nice and hospitable. They had plenty of bamboo bushes palm trees, coconut trees, paddy fields and lush green jungles. But there was one thing very scary in that village. There was one two-storied house in the middle of a field. The house was surrounded by brick walls. It was a very old and stale house. People used to avoid that house because it was said that no one returns from that house. Earlier many people tried to enter the house out of sheer curiosity. But none of them returned. The village people informed the police. But the police, who entered the house, also never returned. So the village people abandoned the house and taught the children not to enter the house ever. They used to call it 'the ghost's house'.

Chintu was a very naughty boy. His parents were very worried about him. His father was a farmer. Chintu used to study in the nearby primary school. He was kind of a boisterous child though he was intelligent and always perform well in the school. But he often used to disobey his parents childishly.

One day he insisted that he would go to the paddy field to sow seeds with his father. His parents denied him. But he kept on insisting. At last he started crying. Then his father took him to the field. He helped his father happily. Since then he started to help his parents whenever he could. At the same time he used to steal fruits from others' courtyards with his friends during vacations. They had a mango orchard at their house. But they did not have the trees like litchi, jack fruit. So it was fun to steal those during vacations. People knew the gang of children and they used to pamper them. But Chintu's parents were very worried regarding the courage he had at this age since he used to come to the house crossing the haunted house. Chintu's mother used to tell him a story about the haunted house. She used to say that the house was full with ghosts that devoured animals and human beings. So it was better not to enter the house at any cost. But Chintu argued, 'Mom, teacher said there is nothing called ghosts and it's all in our imagination.' It was night. So she did not extend the conversation and told Chintu to sleep. But inside she became very worried and decided to meet the head teacher of Chintu's school.

Next day she went to the school with Chintu and asked not to instill such ideas regarding ghosts and spirits into Chintu's head. The head teacher asked Chintu, ' Who told you that there are no ghosts?'

-'The new sir.'

-'Suresh? I will warn him not to lie to the children anymore. Ghosts are definitely there and that's why no body returns from ghosts' house. Suresh is new here. Probably he does not know about the haunted house. I will definitely tell him about this.' Chintu's mother left the school. But Chintu became curious about the haunted house.

It was a vacation time again. It was a cool autumn. Chintu and his friends were sitting under a tree and gossiping. It was noon and lunch time. So one of his friends suggested that they should leave now and they would meet in the afternoon again. Chintu said that he was not hungry. All of them left but Chintu. Chintu had a plan to visit the haunted house.

He opened the gate and entered the ghosts' house opening the front door. It was not latched from inside. He found nothing wrong. It was stale and dirty. One staircase went up to the first floor. He was scared. He did not went up. He started checking the furniture at the ground floor. He opened an almirah. It was full with books. But no body touched it for a long time it seemed. Then he went near the settee and sat on it, though it was dirty. It was old and still comfortable. While siting he noticed that a window was not latched from inside. He got up and tried to move forward to the window. The moment he reached the window, he fell down into an underground tunnel. The tunnel was horrible. He fell down on heap of skulls and bones. He thought he was trapped forever. Light was coming from only the hole through which he fell down. In that light he could see vaguely that the tunnel leads to some place. He had no other choice but to follow the tunnel. He had no light. So he started walking in the dark like a blind man. After at least one hour he got stuck to the other end. He pushed hard and he saw daylight again. He was so happy.

The other end of the tunnel was covered with a small piece of turf which opened within a bamboo bush. Chintu covered the tunnel as it was and saw the river nearby. It was almost late afternoon. He started to find the way for his home. After a while he could recognize the place and reached home after another hour. His mother was worried as usual. She asked where he went to. He did not tell the truth. He said, 'I was walking on the riverside and lost the way back and entered the jungle.'

-'What about lunch? Are you not hungry?'

-'Yes, I am very much hungry.'

His mother brought her some food and scolded him severely.

After the vacation in the school Chintu told the new sir that he was right. He entered the ghosts house and nothing happened to him. There were no ghosts. He told the whole story to Suresh. Suresh asked him whether he told about it to anyone else. Chintu said, 'No.'

-'Good. One day I will go with you. But remember there might be some people, who were accidentally not there at that house or in the tunnel on that day. You are lucky that you survived because I heard that some policemen also disappeared from that house. Now I see the reality.'

Chintu walked past the ghosts' house and looked at it.

One day Chintu and Suresh planned to visit the haunted house once again. They reached the front gate of the building. Suresh told Chintu, 'Listen don't make any noise. That day you were lucky. Today there might be some people and may be they are very powerful. They will definitely try to kill us if they find us in. So be careful. No noise. Okay?'

-'Okay.'

They went inside the house. Chintu showed him the way to enter the tunnel. They went near the window and removed the slab that was loosely attached on a rod that rolls down when some one steps on it making him fall inside the tunnel. They opened the slab and jumped into the pit. Again they fell on to the heap of skulls and bones. This time they were prepared with a rope, torch light and knives. Suresh switched on the torchlight and what they saw was mind boggling. It was a tunnel with no ends. But it was not only a tunnel, but it had also got caverns and small caves on the side walls. All the caverns and caves that were visible were closed with doors and from one of them a little light was coming out. They approached near that cavern. They heard some voices. Some people were chanting hymns they could hear after a point.

Then they stood in front of that particular door of the cavern and they saw inside a group of people were sitting encircling a candle and uttering some mantras. They also found that each one of them had ferocious weapons starting from guns to daggers. They got scared. They immediately walked past the cavern. In the next cavern there was no people. It was all closed with a wooden door. They opened the door slowly and found jewels of immeasurable values. They took some of the jewels in their pocket and then went to the next cavern on the opposite side. That cavern was also throwing a faint light through its doors. They saw through a gap that another group of people was killing a man. After beheading the man, they kept his head aside and removed the clothes of the man and cut his body into pieces. They kept those pieces on some plates and prepared to fry them in a big frying pan that was there on a fire. Chintu got shocked. Suresh put his hand onto his mouth. They walked ahead a bit and whispered into his ear, 'We better go back.'

-'Yes'.

They went back. But this end of the tunnel was high enough. So they had to use the rope to climb up. They sighed after getting up on the floor. Immediately they went out from the haunted house. It was afternoon. Suresh told Chintu to go home and said, 'Don't tell anybody anything. A whole cannibal community is living underground. That's why the house was haunted.' Chintu could not sleep properly at night. He had a dream of cannibals killing him. He found the jewels in his pocket.

Next day in the school Chintu found Suresh talking to a police officer. When he saw Chintu he called him. When Chintu came along , Suresh told the police officer, 'He is the child sir. He discovered it and told me about it. And they are very rich and very powerful. What Chintu? What do you say?'

-'They have enough ammunition and weapons to kill ten twenty armed people. We saw only one percent of them. The police officer thought for a while and then said we have to inform the army.

The army came. But it was hard for them to drag the entire cannibal community out of the tunnel. They had heavy ammunition and weapons and they did not surrender since to them it was their way of life - the religion. They could not survive without being cannibal. So it was a huge battle between Indian army and cannibals. At last they got defeated and the remaining cannibals were forced to surrender. Chintu and Suresh got national bravery award. After a long period of time the village slept in peace.