After skeletal remains unearthed in Shah Faisal Colony house, a tale of madness unfolds

N’s parents brought her to the devotees after she hallucinated someone was trying to strangle her.

KARACHI:

There is an air of mystery and fear in the neighbourhood surrounding house No. 943 in Shah Faisal Colony where the skeletal remains of a so-called spiritual leader were discovered early on Thursday morning. As far as the eye can see, every woman and child in the narrow alleys stand at their stoops and exchange tales of djinns and exorcism.

The single-room structure housed a raised grave that was covered by a green cloth inscribed with verses from the Holy Quran. Strangely, there was also a small gate to the right of the grave’s wall.

A woman from the neighbourhood, who used to visit the house, said the devotees of the saint would drag a ‘possessed’ person near the mouth of this gate and chant verses in order to break the spell. Saleem, who lives right next door, says no man was allowed to enter the house and only women could go inside and meet the ‘Pirni’ (female spiritual leader) to solve their problems.

“Nobody knew exactly what went on inside there,” he said. Residents say that they heard voices coming out from the house as recent as Friday night even though nobody could possibly be there since the main accused have been handed over to the police.

They broke into the house again early on Saturday morning and tore down the walls of the grave. They discovered a small room underneath it, but it was empty. Nobody was inside.

On one side of the room sat a large trunk filled with a wad of notes and scriptures. Many of the notes contained the names of people with circles marked on a number chart. An empty frame with a garland on top was tacked up to one of the walls. A small cabinet contained a number of copies of the holy book. Outside, in a small verandah, there was an empty green donation box. Police say it was emptied by the residents themselves who reached before them at around 2am Thursday morning when they heard horrific screams of a young girl coming from the house.

Noman, Ovais and Sohail were all present that night and say the entire neighbourhood rushed to rescue the girl. They broke in and called the police for help. However, no one in the neighbourhood was ready to say who or where the girl went. “She was sent home in a rickshaw. Her mother also came. They lived somewhere in Gulistan-e-Jauhar I think,” said Saleem.

According to SHO Khushnood Javaid, the skeletal remains were that of Syed Mubarak Ali Shah, who died in 1982 in Hyderabad and was buried in Azeem Pura graveyard in Karachi’s Shah Faisal Colony. Shah’s son Ishrat says the house where the skeleton was discovered was actually his father’s property which was taken over by people who claimed to be his devotees. “I was kicked out 20 years ago from my own home,” he says, adding that four people have been living there since, including the main suspect, 60-year old Sharif and his three middle-aged sisters Rafiqa Parveen, Haseena and Rasheeda. All of them were unmarried and never left the house that strangely enough didn’t even have a toilet. “I was forced to take up a residence nearby on rent where I live with my three children,” he said. However, Ishrat didn’t show any documentary proof of his claims that the house belonged to him.

Javaid says the two suspects in custody, Sharif and Parveen, have confessed to stealing Shah’s bones from the graveyard. “They say they are his devotees, and were supposedly instructed by the pir in a dream [basharat] to shift his remains from the graveyard to the ‘saint’s’ house in Shah Faisal Colony,” Javaid said.

A small mausoleum in Pir Mubarak’s name stands even today at Azeem Pura grayeyard. Mumtaz, a caretaker at the graveyard, says Sharif and his sister Parveen used to man the mazaar, but disappeared from the place five years ago after locking it up. “I don’t remember exactly, but I think they had a dispute in the graveyard with someone and left saying that their Pir had left, so they were leaving too,” he said. When the residents discovered the skeleton in house No. 943 and heard Sharif confessing that the bones were that of Syed Mubarak Ali Shah, they rushed to the grave site to check the claim. They broke open the padlocks and the crypt and discovered that the remains were missing. Although the skeleton has been reburied at the same place in the graveyard, his son Ishrat is doubtful. “How can I know for sure that it is indeed my father’s remains and not of someone else?” he asked.

Neighbour Saleem says the brother and sisters were running the spiritual den for at least five years. “They were told many times to stop, but you know how sensitive people are about faith so no one could do anything until early Thursday morning,” he said.

At the centre of this tales of djinns and witchcraft is the story of a teenaged girl, N, who the neighborhood claimed they rescued. Her parents, Mr and Mrs Hameed Khan, were discovered at a house of their relatives four streets away, where they were in the process of being kicked out. “Your daughter is possessed! Have you brought her here to curse us as well,” Rafique was telling the girl’s father.

Khan, who works at the Steel Mill, was on the verge of a nervous breakdown. His wife told The Express Tribune that the neighborhood residents had them kicked them out. “My daughter is sick. We were told by people in the neighborhood themselves to go to the devotees, who they said were able to solve any problem,” she said. The terrified N would see someone trying to strangle her when evening would come around. They took her to a doctor but were told there was no problem. Out of desperation, they went to see Pirni Parveen and Sharif for an entire week. “They would chant verses and make quick crosses in the air, but my daughter suddenly lost control and screamed violently,” Mrs Khan said.

Khan’s son 11-year old Zain doesn’t want to go back to his old home. “Everyone there taunts me that your sister was having an affair with the old baba Sharif,” he said.  Mrs Khan says that at the moment they don’t even have the time to deal with their daughter’s problem. “Everyone has turned against us, including our own relatives. But what was our fault?” she asked.







Published in The Express Tribune, July 3^rd, 2011.