What keeps witch-hunting alive in Jharkhand

As dark fell on the evening of January 30, Chithu Pradhan realised something was very wrong.

Durutoli village, where Chithu lives, in Jharkhand's Gumla district, is more than 100 km from the state's capital, Ranchi. It is surrounded by dense jungle. Early that morning, his mother Sita Devi and her sister Shanti Devi had left to gather wood from the jungle.

Typically, they returned before sundown. That evening, there was no sign of them, even as evening turned to night.

“There was no moonlight, so it was pitch dark outside,” said Chithu, who is in his late forties. “I had to wait until the next morning to go look for them.”

After an entire day of searching, Chithu and his neighbours found the two women in the evening, deep in the jungle – dead. Their bodies bore deep wounds, indicating that they had been attacked with a sickle.

Chithu suspected it was a cousin of his named Kamlesh Pradhan who committed the double murder – and that he had killed the women because he suspected them of practising witchcraft. “A few months earlier, he had accused my mother and sister of practising witchcraft to make his wife fall sick,” he said.

The next day, police arrived and took the bodies away to conduct postmortems. They also arrested Kamlesh.

When I visited Durutoli in October, almost nine months after the crime, Chithu and his wife Munni were reticent and still dealing with their grief.

Chithu noted that Kamlesh had since been released on bail. “We have a hearing coming up in court next month,” he said.

The crime has left the couple shaken. “I am scared to go anywhere alone since the incident,” said Munni. “Even if I have to go to the fields when my husband is not there, I make sure to take a neighbour along.”

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In a paper on witchcraft, the economists Dev Nathan and Govind Kelkar noted that “secret forms of worship by women” have historically been labelled as witchcraft by others in Central India. “It is these deeply entrenched historical beliefs that have been carried forward to the present and are used to oppress women today,” said activist and researcher Samar Bosu Mullick.

Today, stories of people being killed because they are suspected of practising witchcraft, appear with disturbing regularity across the country.

According to National Crime Records Bureau data, since 2000, more than 3,200 people, mostly women, have been killed on such suspicions across the country.

The bureau's latest data for 2023 shows that Jharkhand recorded the highest number of such murders in the country, followed by Chhattisgarh and Madhya Pradesh. That year, the state recorded a total of 22 such murders, twice as many as the 11 murders recorded in 2022. “Witchcraft related murders especially occur in Adivasi and lower caste communities,” said Sanjay Munda, associate professor of psychiatry at the Central Institute of Psychiatry.

Activists say that the actual number of such deaths, and other crimes against women related to witch-hunting, is in fact much higher.

Some explained that there was a pattern to who gets accused and attacked for being a witch. “Often it is women who come from a weak family, they'll be old, or economically weak and their husbands will often be alcoholics,” said activist Aloka Kujur from Ranchi, who observed these patterns when she worked on documenting cases of witch hunting in the region.

“It also happens more frequently in areas where social and health facilities are failing,” she added.

While residents of Durutoli were tight-lipped about the January killings, those of Jamgai, a village adjacent to it, spoke up about them. Their comments made clear how deep belief in evil women who practice witchcraft ran in the region.

“Witchcraft is indeed practised by people in rural areas, they use it to make other people, especially children and animals fall sick, and destroy crops,” said one resident, Baleshwar Pradhan.

Baleshwar and others claimed that Kamlesh's wife had been ill for a long time, and had not responded to treatment, but that after the two women were killed, her health recovered. “This is why people also think there must be some truth in the allegations. Otherwise how did she get better?” he said.

As we stood talking in the village square, an elderly man walked up to us and said, “It's not just the accused's wife, the entire village of Durutoli is healthy now after those two women died.”

I asked women I met if they ever feared being falsely accused of witchcraft. They pondered the question, then shrugged it off. “No, only those who are guilty get attacked,” said Sushma Baraik, a resident of the village. “We are innocent, so why would anyone blame us with no reason?”

Given how entrenched such beliefs are, many argue that basic awareness campaigns would have little effect. “These are beliefs that people and their ancestors have harboured for generations,” said Sanjay Munda. “They are not going to be wiped off by a few awareness campaigns.”

Mullick echoed this view. “Beliefs are an important part of the social and cultural fabric of a community,” he said. “Calling them superstition debases these beliefs and creates disconnection with people.”

Hiramani Deogam, an activist from Chaibasa who has been working on tackling witchcraft accusations for over a decade, recalled that she had recently intervened in a case in a village in West Singhbhum district, where she had earlier conducted awareness drives.

Mullick said that Adivasi and other lower caste communities in Jharkhand are still dealing with the ramifications of the transformation caused by modernity to these communities. In his book Dayan Gatha, written in Hindi, Mullick wrote, “the disintegration of tribal lifestyles” in central India started with the “emergence of the state in forest areas”, and “if colonisation shook the roots of tribal culture, the internal colonialism of the post-colonial era uprooted it in a very short time through the unprecedented plunder of resources”.

Some key changes of this period include the move from perceiving land as collective property to individual property and the shift from subsistence farming to surplus farming for the market. Quoting anthropologist Peggy Sanday, Mullick further wrote, “In situations of extreme social oppression and cultural disruption, men unite and direct their aggression toward women rather than fight against an external oppressor.” He argued that the increased targeting of women as witches was one such response.

Aloka Kujur, the activist from Ranchi, agreed. “Witch hunting is a reflection of the denigrated position of women in a struggling society. Men feel powerful after murdering women,” she said.

In their book Witch Hunts Culture, Patriarchy, And Structural Transformation, Nathan and Kelkar noted that beliefs could not be easily displaced through means such as outlawing them. Rather, they wrote, “the only way of eliminating those beliefs is to replace them with other beliefs or systems of explanation”.

Indeed, while Jamgai has a community health centre, it only stocks basic medicines, and villagers have to travel to Gumla to seek proper medical care. “People usually go see both a doctor and an ojha, but the latter is more easily accessible,” said Sushma Baraik, the resident of Jamgai.

Given this, Munda argued, encouraging people to seek modern medical care to treat ailments could be a step towards drawing them away from healers and superstitions. “Care should be taken to improve the condition of primary health centres and people should be encouraged to seek medical aid,” he said.

Mullick agreed. “The non-availability of medical facilities has a big contribution in accusations of witchcraft,” he said.

The pressing nature of this problem was underlined to me just the day after I arrived in Gumla, when I read about an attack on a woman in Bahvaar Toli, close to the city.

When I visited the village, I met Amin Oraon, whose wife was allegedly attacked by his cousin and next-door neighbour, Suka Oraon.

In 2016, Suka lost his young son to sickness. He accused Amin's wife Bhinsar of practising black magic to kill his son.

After several quarrels and physical threats, the two families visited an ojha, ostensibly to verify if Bhinsar had really been practising witchcraft. “My wife was declared innocent, but even after that, he continued to accuse her of witchcraft,” said Amin.

At that point, the village gram sabha also intervened and tried to convince Suka to put an end to his threats and accusations. The police were contacted to mediate, and Suka was made to sign a bond stating that he would not accuse Bhinsar of witchcraft or cause her any harm.

Earlier this year, Suka's mother and his brother died of an illness. Once again, he began accusing Bhinsar of practising witchcraft. “They didn't take good care of themselves or each other. When they fell sick, they went to the ojha instead of the hospital,” Amin said. “And after the two died from neglect, he blamed my wife and tried to make himself feel better by taking revenge on her.”

It did not help that the two families had a history of discord. When he was a young child, Amin recounted, his mother was accused of practising witchcraft by Suka's family. “We were socially boycotted from the village for a while,” he said. “So, we went deeper into the jungle and built another house far away from others.”

With the renewal of conflict between the two families, Amin said he and his family “began to stay more in the other house, but we would return to the house in the village for some work or the other.”

On October 19, Amin, who works as a painter, left for the market in Gumla to buy some paint for a new job. While he was away, he received a phone call informing him that Suka had attacked his wife.

Bhinsar survived the attack, but was grievously injured. The incident left the village shaken. “There were a lot of fights between the two families, we've intervened a few times before but we didn't see this attack coming,” said Mahesh Oraon, one resident.

Villagers also said that alcohol played a role in the attack. “Suka used to drink a lot. He would get drunk and then make his threats. The drinking begets violence,” said Shanti Devi, another resident.

Activists say government efforts to tackle the problem have fallen short. In 2020, the Jharkhand government launched Project Garima, aimed at ending witchcraft accusations in 25 blocks of the state in the districts of Bokaro, Gumla, Khunti, Lohardaga, Simdega, West Singhbhum and Latehar by March 2023. The project was led by the Jharkhand State Livelihood Promotion Society, in collaboration with the Central Institute of Psychiatry.

Five years after it began, there is little record of what the project accomplished. “That project is over, the CEO left the organisation and we are not working on this issue anymore,” said Bishnu Parida, the current chief operating officer of the Jharkhand State Livelihood Promotion Society over the phone, before cutting the call abruptly.

On the ground, too, there was little sign of the project. Though Durutoli is only 15 km from the district headquarters of Gumla, Chithu and Munni said that they had never encountered any government efforts against witch-hunting in the village.

Chutni Mahato, a social worker from Seraikela-Kharsawan district, who received the Padma Shri in 2021 for her work combatting witch-hunting in the state, recounted that the Jharkhand Livelihood Promotion Society had invited her to attend a few events in 2022. “A lot of money was spent but what did it achieve?” she said. “The state needs to be proactive about this issue. A few awareness campaigns won't help in the long run.”

In Phatti Bageecha Toli in Gumla district, an ASHA worker named Punam said that the Jharkhand State Livelihood Promotion Society had conducted anti-witch hunting programmes in the village. But residents said they had never heard of these programmes.

Among them was Gutha Minz, whose wife Maino Devi was accused of witchcraft in 2019 by a family in the neighbourhood after a woman in that household died of a snakebite.

“One day they came to our house and tried to take us to an ojha, but we refused,” he said. “They were very aggressive with us, so we went to the mukhiya who then called the police. They asked us to reach a compromise and made them sign a bond.”

His son Sunny heard from others in the village that the ojha, too, had rejected the idea that Maino was a witch. “But they still persisted,” Sunny said.

Conversations with an ASHA worker named Punam Lakra, and other villagers who asked not to be named, revealed that there were other longstanding conflicts between the two families.

On March 14 this year, the village celebrated Holi like most villages across the country. That afternoon, Maino Devi left her home to go to another house that belonged to the family, a short distance away. She never returned to either home. A few hours later, when her husband and sons realised she was missing, they began looking for her in neighbours' houses and the fields.

They did not find Maino that day or the next, when the police were informed that she was missing. It was late in the evening two days later that a sniffer dog squad found her body buried in the sand next to a river nearby. “If my wife was indeed a witch, couldn't she have saved herself? Wouldn't others in the village, everyone who went against her, also be dead?” said Gutha.

Karampal Lakra, one of the members of the family that had accused Maino of being a witch, was arrested – news reports stated that he confessed to the crime in police custody. “If the police had arrested them back then, maybe my mother would be alive today,” Sunny said.

Though the district administration had visited the family in the initial days after the crime, the father and son said officials had not offered them any legal help or compensation. A court hearing was scheduled in mid-November. “I hope he receives a life sentence,” said Sunny. “If he is released soon, then he could repeat his crimes. And I could get tempted to take revenge on him.”

Gutha's family has not received any counselling or social support after the murder. “There is a lot of trauma and stigma in families where women have been killed in the name of witch hunting. They require special support to get through such incidents,” said Munda.

In Bahvaar Toli, villagers worried about how Bhinsar's family would manage without her. “She has young children, how will they get by now?” said Shanti Devi.

She spoke fondly of Bhinsar. “She was a good woman who always spoke to everyone kindly,” she said. “She was very devout and would always be one of the first to participate in poojas during festivals. Why would she be so religious if she was really a witch?”

Suka ran away before the police could arrest him. He was still on the run when I visited Bahvaar Toli on October 22. “When the police came to the village, Suka's wife blamed my wife for what happened to her right in front of them,” Amin recalled.

Amin told me that looking after Bhinsar was taking up all of his time, and that he was unable to go to work. While he had applied to the District Legal Services Authority for compensation money, he had not received any yet and was relying on his savings for his wife's treatment. “If he needed to hurt someone, he could have hurt me,” he said, tears welling up in his eyes. “Why did he go after my woman?”

Meanwhile, a steady stream of news reports about witch-hunts and accusations continues to emerge from Jharkhand. In late November, three Adivasi schoolgirls in Latehar district were suspended from school after rumours spread that they practised witchcraft. In early December, news reports appeared about police finding the headless corpse of an old woman in a stone quarry in Deoghar district of the state. She was murdered for allegedly practising witchcraft.

“There was a time when I used to keep track of the number of witch hunts reported in the news,” Mullick said. “But I eventually stopped, because there were too many to keep track of.”

Source: Scroll
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