Occult fears: Sidhi infant’s skeleton found

Bhopal: The discovery of an infant’s skeleton, wrapped in a red cloth, along with vermilion, rice and other items typically associated with occult practices raised fears of black magic in a remote village of Madhya Pradesh’s Sidhi district.

Some residents of Khamharia in Bhuimad police station limits spotted a bundle in a red cloth hanging from a bamboo tree outside the village precincts on Sunday morning. Suspicion of foul play soon deepened after locals noticed signs of digging near the burial spot of a child who died months ago, fuelling fears that the infant’s remains may have been exhumed for tantra-mantra (occult) rituals.

“The bundle wrapped in red cloth had bones from an infant’s skeleton, vermilion, rice and other items that are associated with black magic. The bundle was apparently dumped by an unidentified person on the rooftop of a villager, who, after finding it later, hung it on a tree branch. On being informed by locals, we reached the spot and carried out a preliminary investigation. The discovery triggered panic among villagers as superstitions do prevail in this part of the district,” the officer in charge of Bhuimad police station, Dhanukdhari Singh told TOI.

Police said villagers initially believed the remains could belong to a child buried in the village some months ago. However, investigators found no fresh signs of digging at the grave site. “Locals suspected the bones to be of an infant buried a few months ago. However, an inspection of the site revealed that the infant was buried during last rainy season as grass had grown on the surface where the burial was carried out,” Singh said.

Police said the focus of the ongoing probe is to find out who left the bundle on the rooftop and where the skeletal remains came from.