THE HAUNTINGS OF RAJASTHAN

sayan chakraborty 22-Sep-2016 Image Source

Every culture in the world has a conventional belief that there is something beyond what we can see and touch and experts call it a supernatural or paranormal experience but we as common people like to call it a haunting experience and the places where we feel this kind of spooky things are referred to as haunted places. India has no deficiency of such places but if we consider all the places of India as a state of haunted paces, then we can definitely call Rajasthan the capital of haunted places. Actually, Rajasthan has the most number of forts and palaces in India and almost every fort and palace, which can be designated as old, is associated with such a haunted story.

Bhangarh might be the most famous of all the haunted places in Rajassthan, but it is not the only one. While its lofty forts and palaces look hauntingly beautiful, Rajasthan also has the ghost town of Kuldhara, the famous-for-exorcism Sudhabay and marvellous Chand Baori that is believed to be a house of djinn!

1. Bhangarh

One can very well imagine the stories that surround Bhangarh, famously hailed as the most haunted place of India. Visitors are not allowed in this ghost town before sunrise and after sunset as per the orders of the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI). It was built on a hillside by King Madho Singh but was soon deserted. One of the most famous stories that surround Bhangarh is of a wizard falling in love with Princess Ratnavati, who spurned his advances and did not fall for his sorcery. Thus, while dying, he cursed the city, following which it was deserted in a day. People have reported feeling an ominous presence and strange apparitions at the place after the sun sets. There are also some reports of people who post entering the ruins, went missing.

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2. Kuldhara

Kuldhara is another ghost town which is maintained by ASI and completely deserted. As the story goes, it was once home to a huge community of Paliwal Brahmins who deserted the village overnight to stop the state minister from forcibly marrying the daughter of the village head. They cursed the village while leaving, letting it go to ruins. The village was never inhabited after that and is now a cluster of deserted streets, houses without roofs and broken walls, market lanes that look gloomy and a handful of temples. A team of investigators reported paranormal activities such as strange voices, whispers, mysterious shadows, sharp rise and drop in temperature and hand prints of people o their cars.

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3. Chand Baori

Chand Baori, a stepwell in the village of Abhaneri, Rajasthan, is a great piece of architecture. Nonetheless, it has its reputation as one of the most haunted places in Rajasthan and attracts a lot of people. Believed to be worldâ€™s deepest stepwell, Chand Baori, as the locals say, was built by ghosts in one night! A place so grand and huge, with more than 3500 steps, it would take some years to build it. The place is believed to be haunted by djinn, which would not let you climb up the same stairs that you used to get down in the stepwell. Numerous visitors to stepwell have confessed the same.

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4. Sudhabay

Famous as a place for exorcism, Sudhabay near Pushkar, has quite some ghastly sights. While it is not haunted in the typical sense of the word, the place hosts an annual â€œGhost Fairâ€ which has people coming from all over the region to get rid of spirits that possess them. Sudhabay has a well. The water of this well is considered as holy. The annual fair sees a motley crowd and strange rituals, strange enough to give goosebumps, around the well