600 students leave tribal hostel after few show signs of mass hysteria

The authorities in Maharashtra’s Amravati district are grappling with an unusual crisis after nearly 600 tribal students left a Government-run hostel at a residential school, claiming that a few girls there were possessed.

The episode began after four girls started behaving strangely on July 22, crying and laughing uncontrollably, which officials suspect could be linked to mental stress.

The tribal residential school at Doma village of Chikhaldara taluka in the tribal-dominated Melghat region in northern Maharashtra, over 700 km from Mumbai, houses 810 boys and girls, said officials on Sunday.

Rumour soon spread that the girls were possessed, prompting about 600 students to leave the “haunted” hostel, run by the Tribal Development Department, over a span of a few days, they said. According to a hostel source, some of the girls claimed to have heard the sound of anklets clanking.

A senior official from the tribal department said that a team of health experts visited the Doma residential school. “The symptoms have nothing to do with anything supernatural. It could be a selective hysteria-like condition related to mental stress,” the official said.

Several theories began floating after the unusual behaviour of some girls, according to a psychological report prepared by the authorities. Some women from the village also subsequently developed similar mental symptoms, it said.

There is a belief among the students and locals that there was a ‘mahua’ tree at the site of the ashram school, on which spirits used to reside. The school management cut down the tree, and it is believed that the spirits became angry and were troubling the students, as per the report.

Another reason given was that the temple of their deity behind the ashram school was affected/encroached upon by the school’s drainage channel, upsetting the deity.

The third reason being cited is that an Adivasi youth died in a field near the school and his spirit became a ghost, the report said.

It attributed the unusual situation to superstition, fear, stress and local beliefs about spirits.

Senior office-bearers from Maharashtra Andhashraddha Nirmulan Samiti, which works towards eradication of blind faith, also met the students and counselled them, said the official. They appealed to people to view the incident from a scientific perspective rather than falling for blind beliefs, he added.

Amravati MP Balwant Wankhade also urged the students not to be afraid and start attending classes.

Headmaster Sanjay Chaudhary said efforts are underway to counsel the girls and bring them back to school. “A few have returned,” he said.