The Witch Trials Of India- Death By Superstition

India is the land of customs and traditions. India is known for preserving its ancient cultural, religious, and mythical ideology, which is still revered and followed in most parts of the nation. These primitive ideologies don’t bode well in the current modern environment which thrives on science and technological advancement which renders certain ancient practices bizarre and irrational. Witch hunting is one such phenomenon that is taking a deadly turn leaving thousands of people across the country victimized. 

Illiteracy coupled with poverty is an endemic which still thrives in this country. This renders people in villages and rural areas susceptible to irrational practices and the threats and dangers they pose. Since long Indians have believed in praising God for every good deed and blaming man for its opposite. This sort of blind faith or blind superstition is taking an evil turn in our society. One such practice which has its roots deep in superstition is the practice of blaming widows or women and branding them as witches performing black magic and ostracizing them. This outbreak is not concentrated only in villages but also spreading into towns and cities. 

There can be numerous reasons for branding a woman a witch, from a harvest gone bad due to insufficient rain, to the death of a child in a family, to the spreading of an infectious disease or for purposes of land grabbing etc. The bizarre and irrational nature of these accusations can be blamed on rampant poverty and lack of proper education. Serious accusations such as these spread like wildfire throughout an entire village and more often than not, end in murder of the so called witches. For the past decade, around 2,000 women have died as a result of these baseless accusations. Witch hunting in India dates back to a hundred years. The victims who are branded as witches face numerous amounts of torture, beatings, forced to eat excrement, death. The reason this practice still persists is due to the patriarchal model of society as well as the sloppy attitude of the society towards women’s rights. 

The more illiterate and ignorant the people are, the more this evil will spread. Therefore it is important to raise awareness against this social evil so that it can be curbed. The tribal areas need special attention. Our only shot at real progress is if we leave our primitive beliefs and superstitions behind an embrace rational thinking. Many Non-Government Organizations have been established that provide shelter and assistance to the victimized women and help them fight for justice. There is a Rational Association of India that tries to appeal to the common sense of the people and try to resolve such issues and prevent vulnerable innocent women from being victimized. 

The first step that needs to be taken is to ensure that people in rural areas are educated enough to understand the difference between right and wrong and not to fall prey to any superstition and make informed decisions. Lakshyam has already taken this step with providing primary education to lakhs of kids spanning multiple states in India along with volunteer programs to help garner support for this cause so that everyone can join hands to create an educated and a well informed society.