Lady Halima Begum Primary School, Kondhwa

The following story entitled ‘Ghost’ forces Kondhwa school to shut‘ appeared in the Indian Express on 12 March 2011.  I wonder if this could be an outbreak of mass hysteria.

Sultan Shaikh of Kondhwa is not willing to send his children to school. The children say they are scared to even step into the school as they feel it is haunted. Last Monday, almost all students of Lady Haleema [Halima] Begum Urdu [Primary] School, Kondhwa, fled after what they claim was supernatural activity in school.

Five days after the incident, the children are yet to go to school. “If you want to send your children to school then send them, it is not our problem,” this is what the school authorities said according to Shaikh who was bewildered at the claims of the school. Other claims by children include finding random death threats in their notebooks and also seeing an egg-shaped, white ghost on the blackboard.

The authorities of the school have suspended all classes till Monday as parents said the children were scared and did not want to go to the school.

Parvika Khan, the teacher who was conducting an Urdu class for Class 5 last Monday, asked a boy to read the text on the blackboard. But the boy said the blackboard was blank, and ran away screaming that he saw an “egg-shaped ghost” coming out of the blackboard.

It set off panic among students and led to closure of the school for the day.

“It is a conspiracy. Someone wants to defame the school. They must have prompted the boy. We have lodged a police complaint and have sought an inquiry into the matter,” said Rashid Khan, chairman of the Western Maharashtra Educational Trust, which runs the school.

Note that the map does not show the location of the school and should be viewed as only giving a guide the general area.