This article was originally published in The Times of India on 7 Dec, 2019
Khasiapara is a sleepy village on the Assam–Meghalaya border, about 170 km from here. The village is better known as Dainigaon (witch-village in local parlance). Those who get branded as witches and driven out of their homes for practising ‘witchcraft’, take shelter here.
Ask anyone where is Khasiapara and they will shake their heads. But if you say Dainigaon, all fingers will point to this secluded village, which now houses about 12 families—all running away from their homes. Till the 1950s, Khasiapara was a jungle by the Ajagar river. With time, as more people started arriving, it emerged as a shelter. There are 75 people now.
For long, Assam has been fighting the evil practice of witch hunt. The killing of people in the name of practising witchcraft, is very common in rural areas. According to the data available with the Assam Social Welfare Department, at least 161 people were killed in ‘witch hunting’ in the past 18 years in the state till January this year. First, the target is branded as a witch for practising ‘black magic’ and then blamed for everything that goes wrong in the village—outbreak of diseases, natural calamities, death of relatives, floods and even crop failure. The ‘witch’ is then hunted, in some cases they are chased out of the village, but in most cases they are raped or killed in front of the villagers. Victims like Kamani Rabha, 62, live in the village.
On a wintry night, she was thrown out of her house. She crossed the river and found shelter in a jungle. She was punished because she had protested against the sexual assault of a minor girl in the village. She was 22 then. “Sometimes I look back and wonder how I survived amidst wild cats, elephants and leopards. I ate fruits, grass and water. After nine days, my sister Anupa Rabha started looking for me. She had also been thrown out of the village and our house was taken over. We built a small hut and started staying together here,” said Kamani, who belongs to the tribal
Rabha community, mostly concentrated along the Assam-Meghalaya border.
Kamani says the third woman to join them in the jungle was from Lakhipara area of Goalpara district. “Her name was Sibani Rabha. As far as I remember, she was branded a witch and chased away for the death of her husband in some disease,” she said. Sibani passed away in 1990 at the age of 75.
Jitai Rabha, 45, is another ‘witch’ residing in Dainigaon. Her entire family was driven out by the villagers on the suspicion of practising witchcraft in 1995. Now Jitai lives in the village with her husband, two daughters and grandsons.
“First my mother Zabra Rabha was chased out of Dogordaha village after two persons in my neighbourhood had typhoid. They said they saw my mother throw something into their backyard and after that they fell sick. After the death of one person, the family members and other villagers called a panchayat meeting and it was decided that my mother should leave the village that night. After this, my brother, sister and I left the village with my mother,” said Jitai.
Dibyajyoti Saikia, an activist, who recently visited Khasiapara, said, “They have de-linked themselves from the world outside. They do not like people to visit them.”
The children born in Khasiapara do not go to school. The only time the people come out of the village is when they sell vegetables and buy rice. “Though Assam has an anti-witch hunt act in place, departments concerned have not been able to educate the people. In October 2018, the act came into force. Even after that at least seven cases of witch hunting were reported from Majuli, Kamrup and Goalpara. The home department has failed to implement the act in the true spirit,” said Saikia.
The percentage of women in this village is higher than that of men—60% women and 40% men. The Assam Witch Hunting (Prohibition, Prevention and Protection) Bill, 2015, makes witch hunting non-bailable, cognizable and non-compoundable. Some of the worst affected areas in Assam are Sonitpur, Udalguri, Chirang, Kokrajhar, Baksa, Karbi Anglong, Lakhimpur, Sibsagar, Goalpara and Jorhat. Most of the cases are reported from the Rabha and Garo communities.