Ghost Stories & Paranormal Encounters

This story is one that is very famous among the old people of the place where this takes place. As the place is very famous I shall not mention any names.

The family of my maternal grandmother was a very rich and politically important one. Only princesses which remained in India were married to the sons of that family. One such princess was my maternal grandmother’s grandmother. She was not only from a royal family but also a very spiritual person. It is said that when she entered her place of worship (built specially for her), the bells use to ring by themselves. She could be seen talking to Krishna, the one she was devoted to. She would be immersed in her prayer so much so as she would even forget that she needed to eat and sleep. She was married into this family to the only son of a politician. The house was basically a fort with over a hundred rooms. The palace was about as big as the Taj Mahal in India and it had a huge lawn in front. After the death of her husband, my maternal great great-grandmother lived with her prayers. She had given birth to 8 children who each had their own family.

In their spacious lawn, right in front of the entrance, there were many wood apple trees. Now the usual time for my great great grandmother to sit for her prayers was about 5 00 in the evening. This is the east so here the sun sets early. At 5 it would be dark outside. It was said that at this time dissatisfied souls of the priests would descend from the wood apple trees into one particular well which had never been used for any other purpose. The noise made by their laughter was heard by everyone who resided in that house. They used to play the entire night and only return at dawn.

Once my maternal great uncle wanted to make a gate at the place where these trees stood but my great great grandmother sternly opposed this idea. She told all of them never to cut those trees down. She explained that those souls that were tied to that tree would then roam the grounds of this house forever. And she also told them that should anyone wish to do so one had to uproot the tree from its roots and plant it elsewhere. However when my great great grandmother went on some urgent work to some other place, my great grand uncle merely chopped the tree and did not uproot it.

Prior to the cutting of these trees there used to be sightings of these ghosts in white robes and their bald heads would shine but after that there only would be sightings of headless ghosts wandering  the grounds of the fort. Since that time not one of them ever disregarded what my great great grandmother had said. My great great grandmother told them that now these ghosts would only not enter the house till the time she was alive. And the moment she died, the troubles of that house began. No sons were born any longer and the only son of that household was taken by his mother on a divorce. All the previous sons never found any fulfillment in their life.

My maternal grandmother was never affected by this curse as she lived only in Patna and never returned to her ancestral house. All the girls who were sane before marriage lost their sanity on marrying into that household. The house which was so rich was reduced to a beggars house. Such was the wrath of the ghosts of the wood apple tree.

Sent in by Sonali Mukherjee, Copyright 2010