Ritual whipping for 2000 women
This was the Lead Story in the “News of the Weird” column in a newspaper from Macon, USA on 19 December:
In September, engaging in a tradition of the Dussera holiday in India’s Tamil Nadu state, Hindu priests ritually whipped 2,000 women and girls over a five-hour period as penance for a range of sins, from insufficient studying to moral impurity. Said one sobbing yet inspired lash recipient, “(W)hen we are whipped, we will get rid of our mental and physical ailments and evil spirits.”
More details appeared on MSN News back on 30 September:
When a celebrity in Malaysia was ordered to get four lashes for drinking in public, there was a hue and cry, but how about 2000 women getting gruelling blood-oozing lashes for over five hours in full public view? Well, that was what happened in a remote village in Tamil Nadu. Beating women can land men in jail, but in the Tamil Nadu village, over 2000 women were flogged as part of a ritual recently.
The group whipping was done by men priests dressed in flowing red robes. They literally cracked the whip on the women in order to drive away the evil spirits from their body. The whipping was also part of a local belief that it would cure girls in their teens of their illnesses.
The whipping ceremony took place on Vijayadashami day in the ancient Sri Achappan Temple at Bavithram Vellalapatti, a remote village situated on the border of Tiruchi and Namakkal districts.
The 2000 women were made to squat in an open ground near the temple and the line of `possessed women’ extended over half a kilometre. The priests then came with a thick whip and chanting mantras, they whipped the women for over five hours. Young girls were seen writhing in pain and they received the lashes. Many were left breathless and some were seen sobbing profusely… Many were given three to four lashes extra to drive away the ‘multiple spirits’ that possessed them.
One girl was whipped for not showing interest in studies. The parents believed that the lack of interest was because there was an evil spirit residing in her. She was given a good thrashing, but the young school kid did not know if it was for poor performance in her studies or for an unseen and unheard spirit in her body. All she was keen was to somehow control the searing pain left behind by the lashings…
People believe that a few lashes would cure illnesses that afflict women. Some get the lashes as a blessing. Bavithram Vellalapatti village is probably one of the few places were men can flog women in public in the name of tradition and get away.
There’s also a video of a news report, with photographs, at Indian TV station NDTV.
