One night a group of men accompanied by the female kaviraj abducted Subhadra, took her to a lonely spot and asked her to sign a confession that she was a witch. Subhadra, courageous woman that she is, refused to sign. They then proceeded to break her right arm saying that this was the punishment for not signing. When she still refused they broke her ribs and she was left for dead.

Her husband found her and carried her on his back to the main road which was several kilometres away and then got her admitted to the district hospital. Her colleagues in the women’s organisation gave her shelter. Later, when the assailants heard that Subhadra had been saved, they threatened to kill the women who helped her, saying that anyone who helped a witch deserved the same punishment.

Around that time, I happened to be in Guwahati for a convention against globalisation and its impact on women when some of the women who had come to attend the convention spoke about the attack. We rushed to the area. It is difficult to describe the kind of tension that the women were living under. Prajapati and the other women who had saved her had received notices supposedly from the local terrorist group warning them against giving Subhadra shelter. Yet not only were they looking after the injured Subhadra, but had along with many adivasi comrades of the Kisan Sabha, held meetings in the neighbouring villages condemning the incident.

When we arrived, there were over a hundred women from the Bodo community holding a meeting in the block office to condemn the attack. The police had refused to register a case under Sec. 307, attempt to murder, but assured a women’s delegation later that they would do so. The kaviraj has not yet been arrested.

But at least Subhadra could be saved. Laxmi Deb Burman could not. She was a communist supporter and also an active worker of the AIDWA in Tripura. A tea garden worker, she was very popular in her village. In September this year a colleague of Laxmi’s who was running a high fever for several days died in the village. Laxmi had been taking her to the local hospital for treatment but she succumbed to her illness. The following night a group of men known to be involved with the NLFT, a terrorist group in Tripura, came to Laxmi’s house which was in an isolated place, dragged her out, hacked her to death and put up notices in the village that she had to be killed because she was a "witch."

They did not want to say that she was killed for being a communist supporter — so they said she was killed for being a witch. Here also the murder led to widespread protests.

A few months earlier, Lata Sahu, a Dalit woman in Raipur, Madhya Pradesh, who had contested the polls against the wishes of the land–owning castes, was condemned as a witch, stripped and beaten. Recently, in the Warangal district of Andhra Pradesh, five adivasi women were branded as witches and burned to death.

Such cases occur with alarming frequency in many regions though it is difficult to make reliable estimates since cases of "witch" killing are not registered under a separate category. However, available figures as well as collations of press reports do indicate an increase.

Within the month of September this year there were five such cases reported in Bihar. In Andhra Pradesh, 167 such murders have been reported in the last two years. In Assam the figure quoted was over 50 in the last year.

Witch naming, hunting and punishment can include stripping and parading the victim, tonsuring, blackening the face, slashing the vic

tim with knives or any other sharp instrument, beating, burning, burying alive. Those declared "witches" are usually women, although according to one estimate in Bihar, in thirty per cent of the cases, men were the victims. There may be similar figures for other states also.

What could be the reasons for the continuation if not increase in the medieval practice of witch hunting? Conventional middle class thinking attributes the continuation of witch hunting to the "backwardness and ignorance of adivasi or Dalit communities" in which most of these cases occur. Historically, there is nothing "tribal" about witch hunting. The introduction of witch hunting in adivasi communities was itself linked to the colonial "civilising" project.

Recently, the former DG of the ASI was quoted in an article in Frontline as having said that the larger view of shamanism (the world of good and evil spirits) held in adivasi communities was identified by the Europeans with their own understanding of black magic and witchcraft. Earlier women were regarded as healers and granted powers, a far cry from witch hunting.

If witch hunting was introduced by the "educated and civilising power", today its continuance can also be traced to powers and structures located in the main outside the communities where they occur. Looking at it another way, it is no coincidence that the so-called tradition of witch hunting remains while other traditions of marginalised communities which are far more advanced in their democratic content than those practised by upper caste, educated people, are being destroyed.

Some examples are the more democratic codes governing marriage and divorce, child custody, attitude towards widows and single women, towards children born out of wedlock etc. The cultures of dominant classes and castes tolerate only those cultures of others, which coincide with their own views.

The ojhas, those believed to have supernatural powers, are often supported by vested interests who want to manipulate the popular belief in the supernatural powers of the ojha for their own ends. This includes economic, political and social interests.

In a substantial number of reported cases, witch hunting is resorted to so as to rob the woman of her property. In many adivasi communities women have more rights to land although not equal rights. Efforts to exercise those rights are thwarted by the method of declaring the woman a witch so as to rob her of her right to the land. It is not always the family of the woman which is necessarily involved. Particularly where the woman is unprotected such as a widow or a single woman others who have an eye on the land would use the services of the ojhas.

For example, there are cases when upper castes want to grab the land distributed to Dalit or tribal families such identification has been made. Sometimes whole families are declared as "witches’ and eliminated. In other cases, individual financial disputes can also be the reason for witch naming.

Political lobbies and vested interests working with their own narrow agendas among tribal or Dalit communities often use the ojha’s position to influence tribal communities. It is in the interests of these very ‘modern’ political forces to preserve the position of the ojha.

For example, in Gujarat this section in the adivasi community is being assiduously wooed by Hindutvawaadi organisations that see them as an easy conduit to influence adivasi communities. Ironically, it is these ojhas who are being encouraged to introduce Hindu rituals among the adivasis. Cultures which glorify sati find it easy to coexist with witch hunting.

Preservation of caste structures and upper caste hegemony also underlie the identification of Dalit women as witches. In many cases where their caste supremacist positions have been challenged, upper caste communities target the woman in the Dalit family as a witch. In the case of Lata Sahu who challenged the landed castes by defying their order not to stand for elections, she was declared a witch because she directly challenged their political power. However the agent for the identification as a witch was a member of her own caste.

On the other hand, in many areas of the North East, the practice of witchcraft is actively encouraged by terrorist groups who use this tradition to command obedience as also to eliminate opposition to their activities from within their own communities. Laxmi Deb Burman’s case mentioned earlier would be an example. The current emphasis on ethnic identities by some political forces to the exclusion of democratic values also mean coexistence with retrograde practices such as witch hunting in the name of preservation of ‘tribal’ or oppressed caste ‘identities’. That is why there is not a single example of any such community specific political group ever fighting for reform within the community.

Further, when the ‘jadutona’ of the witch doctor fails to cure the patient, a scapegoat has to be found and they are mainly the most poor and vulnerable women who are sacrificed. The target chosen in such cases usually has little social support. Women in non–stereotypical situations, lacking protection or support, single women, women without children, widows and the disabled are most vulnerable. The hunt is usually accompanied by a mob whipped into hysteria by the ojha. Such incidents also reinforce the fear and power of the ojha which suits the vested interests.

There is yet another most powerful material force which helps the ojha maintain his/her power—the World Bank! This proposition is not so far fetched as it might seem. If the human race in its infancy had propitiated the forces of nature due to a helplessness in the face of its power, the kind of powerlessness generated due to the sweeping forces of liberalisation and globalisation unleashed by the policies of the ruling regime of the World Bank, the IMF and the WTO is also a reality.

Proliferating individual tragedies on a massive scale triggered not by unavoidable accidents but by avoidable policies are the context within which superstitions are created and strengthened in India today. Such a social environment empowers unscrupulous elements to exploit and manipulate people.

One of the examples is the collapse of whatever existed in the name of a health system in the face of the aggressive privatisation policy being followed by the central and most state governments. Hundreds and thousands of families have lost members, mainly children due to the increased costs of medicines and health care. At any given time, surveys of tribal and Dalit families would show that at least one member of the family is ill.

In our work in the rural areas, one issue which has come up repeatedly is the increasing indebtedness of families due to loans taken to meet recurring medical bills. The worst affected have been the adivasi dominated areas in remote and inaccessible parts of the country. Large-scale epidemics of malaria, diarrhoea and other avoidable diseases have taken a heavy toll.

In the absence of any medical support systems, adivasi communities rely on the local ojha for magic spells to cure the sick. The power of the ojha over the community increases. There is a direct relation between the increasing ill–health of India’s poor and the increase in superstitions and dependence on ojhas. This is one of the major reasons why it is so difficult to break the ojha’s hold over community belief.

There is thus a coalescing of many forces and factors. It is their powerful presence, often backed by the State, which drowns out the voices and efforts of those who strive, like Subhadra and her colleagues, to free their sisters and brothers from the power and influence of the ojhas. They do so at great risk to their own lives.

Women’s organisations in India have long ago rejected narrow frameworks of analysis, which view developments impacting on women only within the male–female equation. The practice of witch hunting can be fought effectively understanding and exposing the links between this practice and its supporting structures.