From our Correspondent

SILCHAR, June 23: Superstitions are habits rather than beliefs. Indeed! Though science has been developing by leaps and bounds, yet the superstition still exists in the society even in this 21st Century.

Students of Sirajul Ali Higher Secondary School, Borzatrapur under Borkhola constituency, have been experiencing a sort of paranoid feelings for the last few days that has created a sort of panic and hue and cry among the students. People of this area suspected it to be the  ghost of Siauddin. According to the locals, the students of the school also had the same experience earlier of a shadowy figure haunting them.

Sirajul Islam Laskar, principal of the said school, said that dozen of students fainted since Tuesday last. “Students especially girls suddenly scream, cry and then faint,” he added. According to him, 3 students fainted on Tuesday, 2 on Wednesday, 8 on Thursday, and 7 on Friday. However, out of all there was only one boy who had such bizarre attack.

While talking to The Sentinel, Sirajul Islam also did not deny the presence of Siauddin, a ghost, in the school campus. “After witnessing such haunted scene, we rushed to the mullah, where he told us that it is an attack of supernatural entity,” he added. He further said that the priest had assured them that he would find solution to the bizzare problem. He pointed out that in order to exorcise the evil spirit, the local mullah have also performed religious rites and rituals in the school campus.

He further said that the teachers took some of the affected students to the Borkhola Primary Health Centre, following the attack, where doctors found no sickness and described it as psychological affair.

Altaf Hussain Mazumder, an English teacher of the school, had a contrary view as he completely denied the presence of supernatural entity and said that it was a psychological effect and it might have happened from the weaknesses. He further said that those who had such attacks, majority of them were found with empty stomachs as the students came to the school early in the morning without taking any food. He also added to say that some students had such illness since their birth as he cited an example of Mili Begum, a former student of this school, who came under this kind of weird attack once in the school but it was found later that she had come across such abnormal attacks a few number of times since her childhood, even when she was at her home.

Sahidur Rehaman Laskar, former student of the school and a now a vendor said, “I have also read in this school but never come across such event.” According to him it was not weird phenomenon, rather a psychological sickness.

When asked about the incident, Hillol Bhattacharjee, vice president of the People Science Society, said that it was a case of hysteria caused due to several reasons. It was his opinion that it started with one student and spread to all. He cited an example that sometimes people especially women get fainted by seeing blood. “So it is a psychological disease that spreads from one to one, which we call it ‘mass hysteria’ in the scientific language.” He further said that his organization visited the school and would soon organize an awareness camp on this matter in the school with the doctors of Silchar Medical College.

However, the school authority said that they had informed the Inspector of Schools regarding this issue, but no step had yet been initiated.