Introduction:
Salem Witch Trials, a thing of the past, now may not seem to be of much relevance other than as a part of history, but in India, in so many villages, is still a belief to be eradicated. India, a home to many religions and cultures, has its spiritually uplifting and glorious side, which gives India a magnificent glow, but at the same time, it is no secret that blind faith has led to many serious repercussions. This happens in the form of Superstitions. These superstitions are found to sometimes be innocent, but can often change into being extremely dangerous. One such superstition, which has haunted the lives of women over many centuries is witch-hunting.[1]
A witch hunt is one, wherein, most often, a woman is branded to be a witch by the people of the community, a lot of the times the people of her family as well. She is accused of performing sorcery, as a result of which most things in her family or community have gone wrong. The punishments these women have to face can range from public shaming to brutal deaths.
What is witchcraft and witch-hunting?
Witchcraft is usually associated with using black-magic to get personal gains, which is morally against the ideologies of many religions, which is why this activity is associated with being an evil act. In many regions of India, usually a person identified as a Bhopa or a “local ‘quack’, with doctor or a healer like abilities, is the one who pronounces an unfortunate situation to be an act of witchcraft. This is usually when the doctor is not able to identify the exact problem or the cause of the problem, thus gives it the name of witchcraft. The person thus identified by the local ‘quack’ to be the perpetrator of such an evil act is then either tortured or executed by the public, so as to eradicate the source of the problem.[2]
Who is the victim?
Women are generally the ones blamed for witchcraft. Women generally are the ones blamed to be jealous of other women’s or people’s lives, are sough to be the ones who would resort to such methods. Women are also a weaker section of most of these societies, thus an easy target to be branded as a witch or someone weak enough to resort to such methods.[3]
Women who are perceived to be different from the traditional definition of a woman, or ones who maybe a little more independent, due to owning land or education or not being married, are often the ones most susceptible to such accusations.[4]
Further, studies have also shown that more than young women, older women from ages 40-60 have often been a victim of a witch hunt, as these women were mostly well established in their households. This can be due to family power dynamics and family disputes.
Types of Attacks
The women who are witch-hunted may just be removed from the society and be forbidden to enter ever again. But others may fall prey to many brutal punishments. Often times these women are tortured for a long period, raped or gang-raped, or killed in a brutal manner. Some of the worst treatment is given to these women.
Witchcraft killing/witch-hunting cases in India
According to India’s National Crime Records Bureau, more than 2500 people in India have been tortured and killed in these hunts between 2000 to 2016, most of them being women. Further, as per the statistics, each year around 150-200 women are being killed. However, this number can be a lot higher as witchcraft is usually not stated as the motivation for murder.[5]
Why and where is it prevalent?
Due to deeply persisting superstitions and beliefs that people who perform which craft can use magic to cause harm, that these witch hunts are still very much prevalent. These people, generally women are perceived to perform their magical abilities to cause issues like the death of a child, diseases, famines, death of residents of a village, death of animals, poor crop season, poor weather, etc in a village or a community.
This practice of Dayan Pratha or ‘witch hunting’ is prevalent in Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Bihar, and Uttar Pradesh, and is hidden in several other places. These are mostly the most backward and rural areas of India, but in certain cases have even occurred even within the urban areas.
Regulation through laws
Various states have over the years enacted various laws related to the prohibition of witch hunts. Special laws like criminalizing the acts of “identifying” (Prevention of Witch (Daain) Practices Act 1999, Bihar and Prevention of Witch-hunting (Dayan Pratha) Act 2001, Jharkhand) and “exhibiting” any person as a witch along with the mental and physical torture accompanying such identification (Witchcraft Atrocities Prevention Act 2005, Chhattisgarh), and many more have been enacted.[6]
Along with this many provisions of the Indian Penal Code relate to threats, slurs and defamation, trespass, intimidation, destruction of property, assault, physical hurt grievous or otherwise, and a range of sexual offenses and murder, and thus provide protection.[7]
Why are laws non-effective?
But often these laws are found to be non-effective. The two primary reasons are, firstly, even though various special laws have been enacted, they consist of very few acts of violence in the case of witch hunt, around 4-5 provisions, when in reality the acts of violence range widely. Secondly, more reliance is placed on the provisions of the Indian Penal Code. The problem with that is that even though it covers a wide ambit of crimes, the intensity of such crimes is very mild. The crimes usually occurred under witch hunts are not simply acts of rape or murder, these can get a lot more brutal in nature, which is often overlooked by the IPC.[8]
Another major underlying cause of the prevalence of such acts of violence is at the very inception of the crime, i.e., the identification of ‘the witch’ or the victim. Identification of the victim becomes tricky because the actual victim is the perpetrator of evil in the eyes of the insiders (or the villagers/residents of the community) and the victim are they. Further, witch hunts being mostly a gender-based crime, the women affected are often robbed of their property and livelihood. These women generally belonging to a vulnerable section of society, do not end up reporting such crimes.[9]
Suggestions
There exists an immediate need to have laws not only focussing on the problem of witch hunts, but covering all of its aspects as well.
Whereas various laws and acts have mainly focussed on the crimes and providing protection to the victims, they have ignored that the problem is most prevalent in socio-culturally backward societies. Due to a lack of education and awareness, such superstitious beliefs continue to prevail. Women in these areas are usually targeting only at the occurrence of an unfortunate event like widespread hunger, deaths due to diseases, poor agriculture, etc. which are problems that can be solved with the right resources provided to the people of such communities. But because of lack of education, primary health and medical facilities, etc. are these people still resorting to such superstitious methods.[10] Thus, it is necessary that adequate focus must be given to these problems as well.
Conclusion
This problem of ‘witch-hunting’, as we saw, is still very much prevalent, mostly on the socio-economically backward areas of our country. Usually, brutal acts of crime are committed in the name of witch-hunting. Mostly done to women, it involves the brandishing of a woman as a witch who indulges herself in acts of black magic so as to cause harm to people of her family or society. But often many brutal crimes out of personal vengeance are done in the guise of witch-hunting.
Therefore, the issue in front of us is to provide all kinds of protection a victim may require, to the full extent and at the same time focus shall be put on the improvement of the socio-economic standards of such communities, so as to eradicate the problem of prevailing of such superstitions in the first place, as a long term solution.
References:
[1]Rai, D. (2020, January 29). Atrocious Witch Hunting Attacks in India: Need for Central legislation. IPleaders. https://blog.ipleaders.in/witch-hunting-attacks-in-india/
[2] Supra note 1
[3]Yasmin, S. (2018, January 11). Witch Hunts Today: Abuse of Women, Superstition and Murder Collide in India. Scientific American. https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/witch-hunts-today-abuse-of-women-superstition-and-murder-collide-in-india/#:~:text=The%20attack%20on%20the%20trio
[4]Alam, S., & Raj, A. (2018). Witchcraft and Witch Hunting in India: An Assessment.
[5] Supra Note 3
[6] Mehra, M., & Agrawal, A. (2016). “Witch-hunting” in India? Do We Need Special Laws? Economic & Political Weekly.
[7] Supra note 5
[8] Supra note 5
[9] Supra note 3
[10]Verma, A. (2019, August 6). Global Voices – Witch-hunting still claims lives in rural India. Global Voices. https://globalvoices.org/2019/08/06/witch-hunting-still-claims-lives-in-rural-india/
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