Ghost Stories

The Intake

How normal is Paranormal?

***

'As above, so below; As within, so without

***

"Do you believe in ghosts?"

"No!"

"Why, but?"

"Have you seen them?"

"Have you seen God?"

"I have felt his presence in holy places!"

"Go to the graveyard in the 'dead of the night', you will feel spirits too!"

***

Since our childhood, we are fed with fear and are expected to be fearless. The same way how we are taught patriarchy and are expected to be educated, how we see our families fighting, and are asked to carry the burden of those fragmented filaments of relations. The sheer incongruity in our pedigree says a lot about our lack of clarity in various aspects of life, primarily 'faith'. And what is an Indian who is not faithful? India is diverse in its unity, and united in its diversity, and what connects us all? Constitution! Do you ask? No! Faith, it is!

And there is nothing such as rational faith, but people who believe in ghosts or spirits are looked down upon, among the faithful people. How diabolical is this discrimination?

 In 2002 a very infamous 'Kundanbagh Murder mystery' came ashore. An intruder with malicious intent, invaded the house only to discover three dead bodies. Reportedly, the family was a mess. A drunkard husband who occasionally visited his wife and two children to fight and abuse them. A 'tantric' was their more frequent guest. If neighbours are to be believed the case was not so simple. The mother was a part of satanic rituals and sacrificed her children and drank phenol to surrender to some 'power'.

' "We have heard children crying all the time, they used to sit alone in the park!" the witness said"

People also saw her walking in the corridors of the house with a bottle of blood'

Every single statement sounds spine-chilling and gory. There is every possibility, there is every point of view only thing missing is 'truth'. And if you think this is creepy, let us look at another incident. Before jumping to the actual story let us talk of a fictional plot –

A village in which people with their distinctive faith lived, came a 'Tantrik'. Ugly and in sagging clothes he just came. He sensed something wrong, people gathered around, he started dancing and off his mystic powers he seeped out blood out of a lemon, and he was not making 'pink lady', rather on his command people accepted that a woman in the village was a witch and then that lady was bathed in her own blood and lynched. The 'Tantrik' left the village. Just like God, he had his own way. And dare you to call the villagers dogmatic, you don't question God, that is the rule number 1, so how can they be dogmatic? They are obedient. They have kept the priest happy, but not the rational people. And we all know you cannot make everyone happy. So better slay innocent people, as per messenger of god's command. At this point, the 'Tantrik' might even throw a scripture on my face, and we might kick a new religion out of his butt.

The question is not about the existence of ghosts, even if they are they are nothing but smoke that comes out of our dad's pipe. The fear is of these lunatic people who have succumbed to dogmatism and fanaticism. The victim here is Debjani bora, a national level javelin player. As per doctors she no longer can play the sport. The baba won, the athlete lost by 1 meter, had the lemon touched someone else, she would be safe. But for how long?

Faith might not be rational, but nothing is wrong until it is harmless. By that definition, Faith is not safe anymore. It was never! You may call me a heretic but I think this is education in its purest form. What makes humans so different from other animals? Our mind. And what made our mind this different, maybe god! But I think, questioning!

We are here because we questioned. We were never satisfied, we were curious, we were ignorant, we still are, as hungry as we were, but stronger than we were. Questioning can never be wrong.

Our culture says, "I stand forth my teacher and the god, whom should I embrace? The one who brought forth the god, my teacher!" And our teachers asked us to question and clear our doubts, and if we question; all the religions to a great extent would come to scrutiny, and what is better than one heretic, his corpse. Because it doesn't question, and thus religions are safe.

Religion is not God, it not bigger than Law, nor humanity. Religion is mere ego, root to all the restlessness, why would God make it? Krishna said that when religions become rigid, the world comes to an end, he himself being the God added a catalyst to cause Mahabharata, or mass destruction, because he believed that people with rigid thinking must leave the earth.

Religions have been timely amended by humans, as they only made it. God made happiness and peace. Fear not the ghosts but the evils inside us! Slay them and not the innocent people, of your mere ignorance, blind faith, witch hunt and dogmatism.

Coming to the title and the introduction, I would like to revise what have we just learnt. Our birth as a human marks our journey by which we can attempt to make this world better. We are fed with every emotion and reflex, this intake and accumulation make us the most complicated species. We have a society to function in, and there are rules. We have diversity with diverse rules. Leading to confusion. There is a crime. There is belief and also faith. Often we are so consumed by our surroundings that we simply choose to forget what we are made for. We are a species meant to survive if I am to explain. And to make sure we survive, we must take out the evils which are getting us close to doom.

Paranormal is the only normal thing. There is no place for emotion in science, the boiling of water doesn't alter the mood of scientists. Science doesn't deal with emotions, but they are real. For us lunatic people are abnormal, for them we are abnormal. When we light a lamp, it doesn't occupy the darkness just makes its own space, it cannot conquer over darkness, it still prevails above it, waiting for it to blow out, and then the darkness devours everything like it did erstwhile.

The possibility is what defines our survival, and by that logic, nothing shall have any meaning and everything can be meaningful. But narrow mindedness can be lethal. So better be safe in this world. There exists good energy in balance with bad energy, which further is subjective. What we choose, we become that. All of us are what we extemporise throughout our life. So be aware of what you take in because it directly correlated to what you emit out.

The fight is not between God or Satan, but between rationale and dogmatism. And must we fight our urge to succumb to that convenient blindness, and must me choose logic over anything. And shall we not shake someone's devotion, but also not let anyone's malicious intent win over, humanity and justice.