Reincarnation : Shanti devi
One of the mysteries puzzling human mind since the origin of mankind is the concept of “reincarnation.” We Hindus believe in reincarnation. It is believed that every soul will pass through 7 lives. Till those seven lives, living beings will reincarnate over and over again, after which that soul will attain liberation (moksha), but do we really believe it? Does it really happen? Is there any proof for it?
So here today we have a case that could be evidence to the concept or it might not let’s find out by going through the story first.
Born in Delhi in the 1926, Shanti Devi spoke very little during the first four years of her life, until one day she declared to her family that “This is not my real home! I have a husband a son in Mathura! I must return to them!”
Now because of her young age, her parents didn’t take her seriously, but Shanti persisted. Discouraged by her parents, she ran away from home at the age of six, trying to reach Mathura. For 5 years her parents tried to distract her mind but to no avail.Deep down somewhere they knew that something was wrong like for instance she referred to Mathura as “Matra” which was a nickname of the city only known to the locals and for Shanti to have taken up this story as a childhood fantasy, it’s a city really far away from Delhi, and none of her family had ever spoken nor had they been to Mathura.
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| Shanti as a child and adult |
Details:
As time goes on Shanti remembers all kinds of details. She says her old house was painted yellow, and that there is a well on the property. She also talks about a temple nearby that she went to every day to pray to Krishna and that apparently her husband had a rich business, a cloth trader with several homes and luxuries. She explains that her husband wears a reading glass and has a mole on his face. She is also fully committed to her old habits; she wouldn’t touch meat as her previous family never ate meat. Once her parents had bought a saree and she claimed that they had been cheated and that they overpaid as it wasn’t real silk. She was used to wearing fine clothes as her husband was in the cloth trade and sometimes she would use slang words for things used only by people living in Matra. She claims to remember her real name and that it was “Lugdi Devi”. By now Shanthi’s parents were so bewildered and scared after witnessing their daughter’s behaviour. At last a sympathetic grand-uncle came to her aid. He asked her to give him the name and address of her husband at Mathura. This was the first time she ever mentioned his name (as it’s frowned upon for women to say their husbands name). His name she says is Kedarnath Choube. A friend, Lala Krishna Chand, wrote a letter to the address given by the girl and soon a reply came, attesting that the statements of the girl were substantially correct. It was suggested that a relative of her husband pundit KanjiMal of Delhi to be allowed to interview the girl. An interview was accordingly arranged.
When he arrived Shanti runs out and threw her arms around Kanji. She didn’t remember his name right away but she knew it was her husband’s cousin. She talks to him like they were long lost friends and Kanji is shocked as here was an 8 year old girl, whom he had never known of asking if he finally got married, or bought his own house. She even remembered that he had a crush on her. When Kanji leaves he writes to Kedar and informs him that “this is real, this little girl is the living image of your dead wife, and you have to come see her immediately.”
Husband’s visit:
On November 13, 1935, Kedar Nath Choubey, along with his third wife (he had one prior to Lugdi) went to Shanti Devi’s house in Delhi and before they could enter Kedar suddenly thinks of one more way that he can test this girl. He would say that he was Kedar’s brother Ram and if she believed him then they would know whether it’s all a fraud and to his surprise Shanti Devi recognized her husband and expressed motherly affection towards her son Nitlal who was now her elder. She burst into tears and sobbed for about an hour. Late at night Kedar Nath Choubey took Shanti Devi in a separate room, and put her some intimate questions. Kedar Nath asked Shanti Devi how she became pregnant even when she was unable to get up because of arthritis. To this Shanti Devi explained the entire process of intercourse to Kedar Nath. She even remembered that when she was pregnant she saw him cheat on her and also remembered the promise he had made on her death bed that he wouldn’t remarry (which of course didn’t come true). He was satisfied by her answers and was moved to tears.
Meanwhile this news spread through the entire country. Even in India with majority of population being Hindus, recorded reincarnations are very rare. The news finally reached Mahathma Gandhi and he was intrigued by the case but so far this evidence is all anecdotal. So he suggests Shanti’s family to take her to Mathura, as this is where she remembers most of the events happening.
The investigation:
On Nov 24, 1935 the whole family leaves for Mathura along with a group of objective witnesses (who can evaluate her behaviour). As soon as she got off the train she stops on the tracks and falls to the feet of an elder male and calls out that he is Lugdi’s brother in law and of course she was right. Then she takes the committee into town and leads the way to her old house. Shanti had said that the house was yellow, but when she gets there it was white; however the people who live there now say that they painted it, because it used to be yellow. Later when they visit her 2nd house she is momentarily confused as there used to be a well on the property and then Kedar picks up a stone and shows her the spot where it used to be. She was right again. She recognises her old clothes, her old jewellery as well as other stuff. She goes straight to a room and remembers hiding some money in a certain spot before she died and Kedar confirmed that he had found money in that exact spot. Finally she goes to the temple where she said she used to pray. By now word had spread through Mathura on what was going on and literally a crowd seemed to form outside the temple to witness Shanti.
When the committee is all done with the evaluation they address the crowd: they confirm that this little girl used to be Lugdi Devi. They cite all the evidence they had seen that day. They were confident that this is a true case of reincarnation. Then Shanti makes a speech that she was very happy to have stayed in Mathura, but now she wants to go home to Delhi and live the rest of her new life.
After this Shanti’s case becomes famous, word spreads all over the world and everyone were desperate either to prove or disprove her claims. A hypnotic test was conducted on April 13 1936. The hypnotist Mr. Jagdish Mitra, and Dr. Indra Sen was present during the sitting. Prof. Begg took notes. Some of what she said was true, but some weren’t.
Some skeptics maintain there is no way to know exactly what Shanti did and how much she said before meeting Kedar and his family. That was the biggest weakness in this case as there was lack of any investigation before Shanti was reunited with Kedar’s family. There is no way to know if Kedar or his family influenced Shanti or planted details in her head intentionally or not but the evidence is still so overwhelming and no one has ever been able to fully debunk it to this day.
Many philosophers and rationalists interview Shanti in the coming years, each ending up agreeing to the claims of her reincarnation.
“I had almost reached a state of eternal bliss and salvation…but I made a mistake. I was far too eager to come back to earth again, longing to see my son and yearning for my husband Kedar Nath. “My love was egoistical, greedy and demanding. I still loved myself even when I was dead. Therefore I had to experience death’s next stage, reincarnation.” said Shanti in one of her interviews.
Claims of Heaven:
Normally in cases of reincarnation there have been claims that they often remember heaven or a place like it, or choosing their parents for the next life, or being in this waiting area before they can come back to life.
Jim Tucker calls these memories “intermission reports”, because if we are talking about reincarnation there should be a certain interval between the death of the previous person and the birth of the new child. These reports tend to be very similar to near death experiences reported by adults. It usually involves them going into the zone of bright light, or seeing their loved ones or maybe the most detailed example of it is from Shanti Devi.
She didn’t just remember her previous life as Lugdi, she remembered her death as Lugdi, her birth as Shanti and everything in between.As soon as she knew she was going to die she started to pray to Lord Krishna and she didn’t stop even when she lost consciousness and kept praying and she prayed to come back. She was partly aware of what was going on even after she died. She remembered seeing people, visiting her and crying and finally her soul escaped through the top of her head and she moved into another space filled with a silver light. She said other people were there and they were both inside and outside of her at the same time. She understood that they were all waiting to be given orders.
Shanti wanted to go back to her husband and before she knew it, she was in darkness. She was wedged in this tight uncomfortable place with a terrible smell. She was in the womb. And the whole time she was in there she was thinking of her life, her house, her husband, the child she had just given birth to. She knew that these memories were what pulled her back to Earth and they stayed with her as she was being reborn.
There is no way of knowing if this was true. If these memories were to be taken at face value then they support one possible scientific explanation involving a lot of quantum physics. Certain experiments have shown that quantum particles exist in a state called superposition, which means they don’t exist in any one physical place or time they exist in every possible place or time they could go to. When you observe them at a moment you are only seeing that particle that is present at that place and time. Human consciousness could be like these quantum particles. The only way we can observe it in our physical world is when it’s tied to a brain and body, but the consciousness or the soul can still go on existing after that body dies and possibly reattach itself to another body later on.
Even today Shanthi Devi is considered possibly the most compelling case of reincarnation in recent history but it’s not the only case. Children with memories of past lives have been found all over the world. There are tons of such crazy occurrences happening in this world, for which we have no answers. So this again takes us back to the question whether science should be trusted? Does it answer everything? Or is there something beyond science, beyond human comprehension?
The concept of reincarnation could be real or just another crazy faux theory?
Well it’s up for us to decide.
signing off, until next time,
stay snoopy,stay spooky
by the crime nut
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