Category: Uncategorized (Page 6 of 8)

As I had mentioned before, in the absence of telephones and many other modern conveniences, the traditional method of shouting from house to house was resorted to, for transferring the news of Rohit’s death to adjoining villages. Soon, a crowd was gathered and in due course news was sent to Rohit’s wife of his demise. She, as often happens in such cases, was the last to know.

She took the news stoically. He had ceased to be any good as a husband a long time ago. Yet, knowing that he would never come back was a shock to her, but it was something that she expected every day. She told the bearer of the news that she would get to the accident site as soon as possible.

As more people gathered, everyone assumed that the one before them had checked on the man and that he was dead for sure. So, a few brave people went down and tied a rope to Rohit’s body and dragged him up the side of the gorge. He was laid down on the side of the road, and since it was evening, no one knew what to do with the body. So they just decided to wait there till someone who could tell them what to do showed up. Usually they just took the body to the burning site, and performed the rites but today it was too late in the evening for a funeral .

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Among many strange incidents that I was a witness to, the episode of the Dead man walking is one of the most amusing ones. It could have ended in disaster but fortunately it ended well for all concerned.

There lived in a small village, nestled in the mountains, a notorious drunk. His wife was almost on the verge of leaving him and he was on the brink of losing his job. If his boss had not been sympathetic to his cause he would have been looking for a new job long ago. The first thing he reached out for in the morning was his bottle. Only when he had some alcohol in his system was he able to open his eyes and welcome the new day, usually, with a song.

In that village there were very few houses with telephones or any modern amenities. An alcoholic, or any addicted person, usually takes away things one after the other from his home to sell and satisfy his addiction. So this man’s, whom we will call Rohit for want of a better name, house had almost bare walls and minimum furniture. Only the kitchen had some semblance of normalcy because the wife would not let him touch anything there. Some money, that she could lay her hands on, was also kept safely there. Thankfully, the bringing up of the children was a responsibility the relatives had taken on themselves and they were doing a good job of it.

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( This is the concluding part of the story that began here)

One night, as I sat there, at about midnight two men came along, From their dresses, they appeared to be Fakirs of some sort and, as they came near, I realized that I had seen the men before. These were Tantriks that lived somewhere in the area and, these ones, in particular, had claimed that they could rid the people of the Ghost, if the people let them perform certain rites at the haunted place.

“Let’s do it quickly Ramu,” the taller man said.

Ramu, the short, thick guy seemed in no hurry, “No one is going to come here at this time of the night… we have scared them enough.”

“We have, but who knows some one might get the urge to be brave, or some stranger passing by sees us and spills the beans.”

Ramu was not concerned in the least. “If someone comes by, we can always scare him. It will be better and we can get more out of people tomorrow.”

“This greed will cause your downfall. We get enough already… and these people have been nice to us always, why do we have to dupe them, we cannot use the money anyways, we have to live like fakirs and that’s our destiny.”

“You can live like this. I am going to make some money and live better off in some other town. These people are foolish and what if we make a little money of them. Not that we are hurting anyone, or robbing anyone, or killing anyone. Most of the people that will pay us tomorrow have earned their money through dubious means; it’s the same if we take it from them.”

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I have to begin by saying that I was very skeptical about the Twenty- Twenty format of cricket. And with Sachin, Dravid and Ganguly – all seniors players for the Indian cricket team – opting out of the Twenty -Twenty format, my belief about the frivolousness of this new format of the game was further strengthened.

But now, with about a week into the Twenty20 world cup, I stand corrected. Not only is this format more interesting and fast paced, but it also takes up less time of the spectator.  In the fast paced world of today this is a really good thing.

This move of introducing the Twenty20 form of cricket should help in popularizing the game in  countries like the USA where it is still relatively unknown.

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I had, by now, begun to enjoy my invisible status. I had seen things that not many can claim to have seen. Though many-a-times, not being able to do anything about what I saw agonized me. I saw men plan crimes and then carry them through; I saw men plan nice things and do them. It only confirmed what I had always known- our world is full of all sort of people and there are as many – if not more –  good people as there are bad.

During my life, I was always intrigued by stories of ghosts and people who could talk to the dead, and anything supernatural. I always wanted to know if there was any truth in the stories. There was some truth for sure, because I was now something that could only be defined by the word Ghost. But, I was unlike ghosts in that I could not do anything to harm anyone-  neither did I ever want to. Continue reading