THE POOR INDIAN.

Hawera & Normanby Star, Volume XLIII, Issue XLIII, 4 January 1924, Page 2

THE POOR INDIAN.

QUAINT SUPERSTITIONS.

POWER OF MASS DELUSION

CALCUTTA, Nov. 23. India is not only subject to epidemics of diseases. Recent events at Simla, the hill capital of th© Government of India, have shown that the epidemic of mass delusion often met with in the past is not yet dead. The latest scare which has seized the ignorant coolies and servants of Simla is that of the mumiai- walla, or ghostly murderer. Rickshaw coolies—a rickshaw is propelled by four coolies, the number being so high on account of the steep gradients —and syces (grooms) have refused to go out after dusk owing to their fear of this ghostly visitant, which is supposed to carry off human beings and destroy them. Sometimes on a lonely road a coolie will cry out fiercely into the darkness as if in terror, or to frighten something that is approaching. When questioned, he will reply that he screamed because murderers are abroad. One coolie recently shouted that the' mumaiwalla had him by the leg, and that if the sahib had not been there he would have been dragged down the hillside into the gloom to death. These mumiai scares have been known to occur periodically for ffcwo centuries. Eventually they die out naturally. Among other quaint beliefs that are merely amusing is that to shave an inch-square patch of hair on the crown and rub butter into ifc relieves headache. Other sufferers more thorough shave quite a large patch and anoint it with a bundle of leaves. On the whole, superstition plays so great a part in India that the native never seems to be free from it, and in 'many cases it is almost impossible to separate superstition from religious practice and belief. Mass delusion has not always been produced by superstition. Very often it is resorted to for the purposes of political agitation. The agitator Ghandi has often made very effective use of it, for there am always in India plenty of p-iillible people to subscribe to any foolish belief. I