Chabad House Is NOT Haunted!
After the fateful 26-11 attack on Colaba’s Chabad House, the institution has turned into a rumour-monger’s delight. Six months down the line, the Chabad-Lubavitch center, run by Rabbi Gavriel and Rivka Holtzberg, both of who died in the terror attack, has turned into a ghost-story-lovers’ delight with tales of “foul smell emanating”, “street lights flickering strangely,”, “muffled cries of a child,” and more doing their rounds, courtesy albeit a sly watchman.
“My shop was open all through the terror attack but I have yet to see anyone’s ghost,” says hair-dresser Hassan Shaikh who works at Colaba A-1 Hairdresser located barely ten feet away from Chabad House. Pointing out to bullet marks on his shop, Shaikh insists that though there have been tales doing their rounds but he isn’t inclined to believe them as, he hasn’t seen anything untoward till date.
However, Proprietor Mohammed Goush is far from being convinced. “Yahan pe, humne suna hai ki, Chabad House ke andar, raat ko bohut hi ganda baas aata hai,” he says. Besides Goush, a handful other claim they have ‘heard’ about the unbearable stench of burning flesh but not witnessed it themselves. There’s fear writ large across his face as he speaks. “Haan, haan. Maine bhi raat ko aple raste ki battiyan aate jaate dekhi hai. Raat ko bohut dar lagta hai,” adds 22-year-old Tabrez Shaikh.
“Arrey, woh to hafte pehle, apne BEST ke light mein kharabi thi. Ab thik ho gayi aur light bhi bandh chalu nahin hoti hai,” says Hassan Shaikh attributing the flickering of the street-light to a BEST pole fault that has been rectified for over a week now. Bu then, Tabrez isn’t in the mood to relent.
Colaba Electronics owner Babu Gaikwad who runs his shop bang opposite Chabad House isn’t amused. Calling the watchman’s bluff, he says, “These tales are all spread by the watchman who does it to ensure his job remains intact. How else would a watchman do two 12-hour shifts every day for over six months and get away with it? He drives every other watchman away with his ghost stories. The guy is a certified rogue,” he maintains.
The watchman Rameshchandra Panday when contacted proudly claimed, “Mere sivai, koi bhi Chabad House tik nahin sakta. Itni himmat hi nahin hai. Yahan koi bhi raat bhar rahega to uski to --- jayegi.” When asked about the incidence of ghostly occurrences, he instead chose to pose for a photograph adding, “hamaare sahib ko kuch mat bolna, unke samne aapse mein baat nahin kar paunga. Akele mein milo to aur bhi batata hoon.”
Adding gleefully to Mohammed Goush’s “unbearable stench” tale, Panday says that the stench disappears to give way to a “khushboo in the night and alternates regularly.” Working at Chabad House oddly for two shifts – day and night - continuously since December 18th 2008, Panday seems to have successfully milked the situation dry. “He is the only one spreading all these tales. Nobody has seen anything except for him who goes about spreading tales of “hearing muffled cries of a child in the night,” experiencing “odd smells” watching flickering lights and so on and forth. After all, he is the only one to benefit out of the fear generated. His job remains intact,” claims a group of locals who meet every night at a spot near Chabad House but haven’t witnessed anything till date.
This correspondent visited Chabad House on two different nights last week between 2 am and 4 am and ‘heard’ sounds of stray dogs barking and street rats squealing, ‘saw 'the streetlights steady and refusing to flicker for hours on end and registered no ‘smells’ whatsoever. Our tell-tale watchman, on his part, remained fast asleep all through the nights. After all, he’d have to wake up early to talk, right?
