Inayat Bibi (Chachi Naitaan)

She was our neighbor and the wife of our tenant Chacha Allah Ditta. She was an illiterate woman. She was not beautiful at all. She had rather unattractive features. But she was very conscious of her beauty and would do everything to make herself look beautiful.

Naturally, she was very fond of make-up. However, she had a disgusting taste in makeup and used to paint her face with thick layers of dark makeup even during the hot summer days. She would also blacken her eyes with kohl (Surma). Heavy sweating caused by the summer heat, used to take its toll on her makeup. It would wash her makeup away and would give her an awful look. This used to arouse a nauseating feeling among the lookers-on. But she would never hesitate painting her face with heavy makeup.

She was a very superstitious woman by nature and had a firm belief in the supernatural. She used to get afraid even at the slightest of unusual things/events. She also had a strong belief in the magical spell.

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The lady was obsessed with the idea that the people were hostile towards her family, and always wanted to inflict harm on them through the magic spell. Her fears, however, were absolutely unfounded and baseless, but she could not be cured of her fears. Her superstitious nature had given birth to many interesting incidents, one of which also involved me and my cousin Akmal.

It was the holy month of fasting. One day, we brought crispy samosas for the purpose of iftar (breaking the fast). But the sweet chatni (sauce) accompanying the samosas, was not liked by anyone in the family, so the sachet containing the sauce was thrown in the street.

The next morning, there was a loud hue and cry in the street. Taken by surprise, we came out of the house and found Chachi Naitaan crying at the loudest of her voice. The street was crowded with people including men, women, and children. Everyone was clueless about the cause of her sudden clamor.

After quite some time, it transpired that someone had cast a spell on her house.

When she was asked to prove her claim, she pointed towards the marks of blood on the door. To her, the blood was the sign of a spell. On seeing the blood stains, the people standing there also got terrified and started cursing the unknown hand who had smeared blood on the door with mala fide intentions.

After closely examining the said bloodstains, we discovered the reality. The stains, in fact, were not of the blood, but of the sauce that we had recklessly thrown in the street last evening. The sachet containing the sauce perhaps had struck against the door of her house, and the sauce had spread there leaving red marks on the door.

The superstitious lady took these marks for the blood marks, and the whole drama was enacted. Now we were really enjoying ourselves with the situation amidst the vain efforts of concealing our excitement.

The people, perhaps, had noted our changing feelings. They started staring at us inquisitively. Their piercing eyes made us nervous. Before they asked anything, we had voluntarily narrated the whole sauce incident. The empty sachet lying at the doorsteps lent credit to our story. The people reluctantly came to believe in what we had just told them and started dispersing.

Mrs. Inayat Bibi (Chachi Naitaan), however, was still skeptical about what we had just told her. Such a superstitious lady she was!

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