Overstating, superstition, boredom, administrative failure, or political enemies — is there a common thread that runs through Delhi’s black monkey incidents, NCR’s braid chopping, and Bangalore’s Nale BaIJ UMANG AGGARWAl examines
Delhi, Gurugram, Bangalore, Mumbai, Kolkata — Indian cities that are thought of as developed and considered to be home to well-educated and logic-abiding people would hardly be thought of as breeding ground for unverifiable stories about ghosts, goblins, and otherworldly creatures. One expects to hear these stories from the locals when they are camping at some remote spot as part of a college trip and want a way to add to the thrill. And yet, all these cities have their own history of a phase where a strange creature attacked some residents and confused the wits out of the police and other residents.
What is all the more interesting is that each time such an ‘attack’ has taken place, from the 1990s till 2018, the victims have blamed a rather politically-loaded group as the culprit. They haven’t just blamed supernatural energies, thieves, or animals gone rogue. They have blamed Pakistanis. At certain points, they have gone to the extent of assuming that the Pakistani terrorists must have created genetically-modified creatures in order to cause panic in India.
And yet, despite even imaginary enemies and parallel universes being blamed, there are several mysteries from the metros and other developing cities that make logic seem like just not enough for the masses. They have been passed on from generation to generation, have found representation in the popular culture, and threaten to resurface each time something wacky is reported again. Mass hysteria, local gang of pranksters, and even poor civic sense has often been the authorities’ explanation to these ‘incidents’. But clearly, it has not been convincing enough because the strange stories have not just survived, they have taken the shape of urban legends.
The Braid Chopper
The latest legend to grace the list of wacky stories that haunt urban areas in the country is that of the braid chopper. The first few reports were from Haryana. The mystery of a wrathful woman or ghost or gang of men or — of course — a Pakistani, who would sneakily chop off women’s hair, soon spread to Delhi. The ‘victims’ reported that they felt a sudden headache that forced them to lie down or sit down. They fell unconscious. And the next thing they know, they wake up to their tuft of chopped off hair lying next to them. Not even one of the women whose hair had been chopped off could describe their perpetrator. WhyIJ They never got to see him/ her. All they remember is headache, followed by dizziness, followed by the incomprehensible feeling one would have when their hair is chopped off for no reason by some mysterious creature.
When the incidents were first reported in rural or semi-rural areas around the NCR, the police had reportedly suspected miscreants in the locality or even jealous family members of the victim. But then, the number of incidents grew. layers of complexity have been added to the mystery now that reports of braid chopping have come even from the valley of Kashmir. The separatists, the Indian Government, the Indian Army — almost everybody possible has been suspected. In the more recent reports, women have defined the braid chopper as a masked man who sprays something on them or even hits them on the head to make them lose consciousness. Some have even described the creature as the monkey man, who according to them has re-emerged.
In Kashmir, protests have been organised by groups of people who blame the Army and other authorities for humiliating their women. Some have even claimed that the braid-chopping incidents have been consciously engineered in Kashmir by the politicians who can benefit from it by using the chaos as an excuse to win people’s trust back.
Meanwhile, back in the NCR, people suspect the involvement of some supernatural power or even some group that is exercising a new way to terrorise women. There has been no reportage of theft or sexual assault in the reported cases, even though the police had initially suspected that it could be the motive.
Delhi’s Monkey Man
Stories of monkeys causing menace in particular locations of Delhi, especially in Old Delhi, have become common knowledge over the years. They jump into houses, eat people’s food, steal their clothes, and even tease children after stealing their toys, residents, who are half-amused, half-scared, often share. But in 2001, the monkey stories took such a wacky turn that cases of people losing their lives were reported and the police had to take things in their hands.
The year became witness to what is today known as Kaala Bandar or the monkey man that even has comic books and movie sequences dedicated to it. The Monkey Man was described as a monstrous creature that had black fur and shiny red eyes. It would appear at night, call out to people in a ‘stormy’, screaming voice, attack them with its long, animalistic nails, and then flee before any record of it actually existing could be created.
Cops had to be stationed at select locations to monitor them at night and control the situation. The police explained that it seemed like the work of some mafia group and not an otherworldly creature that mass hysteria had turned it into. Doctors brought to light the fact that all those who had allegedly seen and been attacked by the black monkey did not have any scratch marks on their bodies. They did have bruises from when they tried to run away or even jump in panic, but no claw marks. However, tragic cases of the creature’s alleged attacks were also reported. A pregnant woman fell off a staircase, supposedly in an attempt to escape the monkey man. She died. Two men at separate locations jumped off balconies, again, to escape the monster.
later, even some on-duty officers claimed that they had seen the creature but described it as a four-feet tall man dressed in black instead of a seven or eight-feet-tall hairy monster. Rakeysh Omprakash Mehra’s 2009 Bollywood film, Delhi 6, used this legend as an allegory. And Munkeeman, a 2011 graphic novel by Abhishek Sharma, portrayed him as a superhero. There were theories that claimed that the monkey man was actually a wrathful roop or manifestation of the Hindu deity Hanuman, who must have been disappointed in mankind and had chosen this as the means of expression.
Muhnochwa or face scratcher
Mischief mongers who took full advantage of the frequent power cuts in Uttar Pradesh, menace caused by lost kites, angered beast, or light-emitting aliens fully armed with UFOs et al — the mystery of a creature that scratched the faces of unsuspecting civilians in the State garnered a plethora of explanations. Muhnochwa, as the locals called it, hit rural UP and spread to its urban parts just one year after the monkey man scare had caused chaos in the National Capital. Not limited to night time, there were reports of some strange flying objects or creature attacking people and leaving them severely bruised and scared.
Just like in the case of the monkey man, descriptions of the face scratcher were inconsistent. While some described it as a flying cat that emitted red and green beams, there were others who said that it was a strange, fast-moving insect that was scared of water and bright light. There were also alleged victims who said that they simply could not remember anything that had happened during or right before the attack.
Again, police officers were asked to monitor selected areas. While some came back bruised themselves, others explained that this was just a hysterical version of the menace caused by pranksters. People were quick to assume that the muhnochwa could actually be a genetically modified insect or animal unleashed by Pakistani terrorists!
What people still joke about is how quickly the face clawer disappeared once monsoon set in. This is probably why it was not an alien but just the pain of heat, insects, and power cuts experienced through the lens of mass hysteria.
Mumbai’s Grand Paradi Towers
What was initially known as a coveted place to live at for many years took the shape of a mysterious suicide spot in 2006. Now, unlike Qutub Minar or the DC building in Delhi or other tall buildings, stories around suicides at this point didn’t include just a broken heart, an empty pocket, or a tragic slipping of the foot. They also mentioned a mysterious ghost that would first attract the residents and invite them to the roof and then convince them to kill themselves. While there are others who claim that the suicides were actually a result of emotional or financial crisis, there are others who say that it was actually a spirit that whispered the idea of death into people’s ears.
Nale Ba in Bangalore
This one goes back to the 1990s and precedes Delhi’s infamous monkey man. People claimed that a witch was doing rounds of the city. She would knock thrice at the door of people’s houses in the middle of the night. Then, she would start calling out to them in their mothers’ voice! This would be interspersed with crying. When the person would finally wake up and open the door, there would be nothing to be seen there. And the person would inexplicably die within the next 24 hours.
What do the words ‘nale ba’ have to do with thisIJ They mean ‘come back tomorrow’. Since there seemed to be no escaping the witch’s wrath, people decided to defer it. They would write this message on their door. The witch would come, read, and go back. Night after night, the cycle would repeat itself. Since the people believed that they had managed to fool the witch and gained another day for themselves, some of them even started celebrating April 1 as Nale Ba Day!
Kolkata’s stoneman
The subject for a regional movie as well as a comic book, this unidentified ‘legend maker’ hit Kolkata in the 1990s. This creature would attack homeless people with stones while they would be sleeping. He managed to kill 13 people over a period of six months. Some even claimed that it wasn’t actually an individual but a gang of miscreants that was behind this. The stoneman would hit the prey with a stone — weighing not less than 30 kg — on the head while they would be asleep. Similar incidents were also reported in Mumbai. All the cases reportedly remain unsolved till date. In 2014, similar reports started resurfacing in Kolkata, making people live in the fear of the stoneman returning at any point, in any way.
Blame it on exaggeration, hysteria, superstition, or poor administration, and it still beats all reason — just like other urban legends. Nobody can say with certainty which group(s) could have engineered these attacks. In each case, the only achievement of the attacker seems to be that they got the public to be afraid, so afraid that each account differs from the other.