Many would have strolled Mumbai’s Marine Drive but their naked eye would have not witnessed a melee of people surrounding a peanut seller. No, there is nothing wrong with their cognitive skills since these invisible figures can be seen and heard by a very few only. One of them is Deepta Roy Chakraverti, who realised the oddity of the situation since there was no exchange of money. Neither the peanut packets were decreasing with the seller nor do any of these shadows were paying him. Similarly at Puri images appear before her not seen by others in which an old woman is brought on a stretcher by a young man and some servants to be abandoned in a temple. At London’s Bell Yard she narrowly escapes harm when sought by a shadowy figure on a deserted street .
Initially, many will view Deepta Roy Chakraverti’s first non-fiction “Bhangarh To Bedlam: Haunted Encounters” (LifePositive Books publication) with scepticism which brings together 12 incidents delving on her run-ins with the paranormal across India and the United Kingdom but the way she builds the narrative you gradually begin to feel the other side of the divide.
Insisting that the book is “for anyone who has thirst for adventure, wants to know more about the world which is beyond just the tangible and has an open mind”, she makes it clear that “just because I have experienced something does not mean that I expect the reader to presume the same. The reader must draw his or her own conclusions.”
All the incidents narrated induce empathy. Disagreeing with labelling spirits as “bad” and “evil”, Deepta says, “They often just need understanding and someone who is ready to listen. Who will hear their side of the story? Spirits are people too. Why do they not deserve our sympathy and understanding, why should they not want justice?”
Deepta’s narrative stands out as it is devoid of “fear factor”. “Why should there be fear? There should be an overcoming of fear. A desire to quest, go forward, a zest for adventure and a desire to delve into the unknown,” explains the writer.
A corporate lawyer by training, a psychic investigator by calling and taught by her mother and Wiccan teacher, Ipsita Roy Chakraverti, the author impresses with cogent scientific explanation provided for the different phenomena felt by her. She quotes several authorities to drive home her point. For example Marcel Vogel, the research scientist at IBM’s San Jose Research Centre is quoted when discussing about crystals and their memory retention power in the chapter “Pathways to Power” detailing Deepta’s experience at Indira Gandhi’s residence at 1, Safdarjung Road. The list at the end of the book proves the detailed research done by the author.
Since time immemorial the supernatural, the haunted and the unknown have evoked either fear or awe, or simply outright rejection. Even though we may deny but the truth is that it continues to fascinate us. This has been grasped by the entertainment industry, writing community and even news channels, which thrive by using these subjects to engage us. Crediting Ipsita for training her and others of the Wiccan Brigade “to think and separate superstition from the supernatural and to look at happenings around with an open mind,” Deepta remarks, “Just because I think something, why should the next person follow? There should be an understanding and research which inclines one to believe or disbelieve.”
In the West, she points out there is excellent literature which delves into places with a past and legends surrounding them with the novelists writing about them while the non-fiction researcher analysing the mystical through science, history and anthropology.
The orb story
In the West path-breaking research in psychical have been conducted. Dr. Klaus Heinemann (a physicist, who worked with NASA, UCLA and Stanford) and Dr. Michael Ledwith (Professor of Systemic Theology and member of the International Theological Commission) have done spirit photography, and captured glowing orbs on camera.
Similarly as mentioned in the book, the Wiccan Brigade team led by Ipsita, captured the same orb phenomena on camera not on one, but on eight cameras.
As for India, she remarks, “In our country, we are mired in superstition. Anything to do with psychical research doesn’t stand a chance because our people are not allowed to think for themselves. There are too many lobbies at play, with money and vote banks involved. The supernatural and the psychical have been dragged into the ambit of religion.”
Even though many admit in private about their ghostly encounters most are scared to admit it in public. Attributing it to conditioning since childhood, she comments: “We grow up being conditioned to be afraid of so many things: dark rooms, examinations, etc. Later in life we are afraid of what people are going to think about us if we veer off the majority discourse. So, yes, why just haunted encounters, we are scared of a lot of things.” Deepta goes back to superstition which is used to instil fear by the vested interests.
Over the years there have been many reports, articles, discussions and programmes defining and describing a parallel world. “Just like energy never extinguishes, it changes form, so is it the same with a parallel world. It is a change of form. Being aware of it is a wonderful thing. It brings one closer to loved ones who have passed on. It makes you realise that nothing is impossible,” Deepta builds a cogent case. She cites examples of Dr. Robert Lanza, an expert in regenerative medicine at the Wake Forest University School of Medicine, US who believes that multiple universes can exist simultaneously and while in one, the body may be dead, in another it may continue to exist, absorbing consciousness which has migrated into this parallel universe. On the other hand she highlights the results of clinical experiments conducted in August 2014 by a team of scientists from Berlin which showed existence of life after death.
Having done a fine job of writing about a delicate and touchy subject, she promises to bring more for her readers next year . “It will be a book on places around the world where strange energies play.” Bring it on!
