A true Story on Planchet

Planchet –A true story by Indranath Chatterjee

[ To learn about planchet >> click here]

It had been a bad day for all of us. A Friday and India had lost the one day international cricket match to Pakistan at Sharjah in the United Arab Emirates. All of us had been confident that India would win this time. Our players had been the best – at least on paper. Gloom had fallen down on the people of India and it seemed that we here at Calcutta watching the match on TV were the worst affected. An eerie silence floated from the streets, as if the sleeping beauty had gone back to sleep. None of us spoke in the room we were in.
We were all gathered at my flat in Tollygunj in south Calcutta. My flat is on the fourth floor of a seven–storey structure, with a drawing room, two bedrooms, a kitchen and two bathrooms. A small balcony is attached to the drawing room, which is my respite from the heat in the summers.

The TV is in the drawing room where Suman was sprawled on the floor half asleep. He had just come back from a botanical expedition from his college. Pradip our sceptic was sitting, staring openmouthed at the TV in disbelief. Kiran the feminist was sitting by the side of the window on the table grumbling possibly about cricket being saved by women or something to that order. Nimmi was sitting on the large sofa reading a worn out Harold Robbins possibly for the hundredth time, and I was preparing a large jug of lemonade for all to wet our parched throats, which suddenly felt dry when we knew for certain that we had lost the match.
All of us, except for Pradip made a strange group bound not by age, religion or profession, but by a hobby. We were all interested in the occult sciences.
Pradip, however was the exception. He was my neighbour and was in his third year at college. He was studying for his engineering degree at the IIT at Kanpur in northern India. He was here in Calcutta on vacation with his parents and spent time with us, as he had nothing better to do. He was not a believer in occult sciences. He used to pooh–pooh at us whenever we discussed unexplained phenomena.

After a full half hour of grumbled silence and noisily quenching our thirsts for lemonade, gradually we found our speech.
“Do you know that some building in Malaysia has overtaken the Sears building as the tallest building on earth?” Kiran as usual was the first to start.
“Singapore. Not Malaysia, you dimwit” snarled Suman, by now only half awake.
“The whole lot of our cricketers deserve to be thrown into the Bay of Bengal.” opined our sceptic, with a lot of disgust.
“They sure should if they want people to watch cricket any more” I said matter–of–factly.
“You men are all the same. No loyalty towards anything. This accounts for these stupid defeats.” Kirans’ comments.
We all laughed. Everyone of us knew where her loyalties lay.
Pradip was still laughing when he caught the whack of the rolled newspaper which Kiran had aimed at him. Pradip was true to his short tempered nature. “Cut it off you lesbo” he retorted. Silence. He had hit a raw nerve. Kiran went quiet and then the sobs started coming out. She accepted feminism as a second nature, but sexual preferences was still taboo for her. Possibly the Indian in her still kept the orthodox mentality with respect to sex.
“Cut it out Pradip.” shouted Nimmi, “Don’t act like a chauvinist pig.”
Pradip had realised his mistake but the words that he had spoken could not be taken back. “I’m sorry Kiran” he apologised softly, “I did not mean it. Please forgive me..”
The sobs were still pouring out. Nimmi was trying to placate Kiran with not much avail.
“Do you guys know anything about planchets? Kiran was talking about it the day before. Weren’t you Kiran?” I asked, trying to lighten the situation and drawing Kiran into the conversation so as to erase the last two minutes from her memory. It was after all my house.
Kiran was comfortable with her sobs. Nimmi however caught on. “Yeah. I did some studying on the subject. We require a board with some drawings on it and a medium…”
“You are wrong.” said Kiran, “Planchets are a means of calling spirits of the dead and making them answer your questions..” Nimmi and I winked at each other. Mission accomplished.
“These are done by using a board where the alphabet are written all around the board and also words like ‘Yes’ and ‘No’ printed at diagonal ends.” Kiran continued, “The rest of the board is decorated with mystical diagrams, which has the power to draw spirits as per the various books I have read on the subject. A minimum of six persons are required to start a planchet. A piece of cork or wood called the concentration piece is placed in the center of the planchet and all six place their index finger on the concentration piece. One of them – the medium–concentrates on the person whose spirit is to be called. The spirit comes in, usually denoted by a signal, questions are asked, to which the spirit answers by a ‘yes’ or ‘no’ or spells it out. This is done by the concentration piece moving across the board at a high speed and stopping fractionally at the letters one after the other. A seventh person is required to write down the answers immediately.”
“How does the medium connect with the spirit?” I asked.
“That is quite simple actually” answered Kiran confidently, all traces of her sobs gone. “The medium simply has to think about the person and keep on mentally repeating his or her name continuously. In a way meditate on the persons name continuously till the signal is received that the spirit is close.”
“What is the signal?” asked Nimmi “I mean, is it something specific or only a general sign that one has to interpret?.”
“It could be anything. Possibly one may have to interpret the signal. I.. I am not very sure. It actually depends on the psychology of the spirit, I guess” answered Kiran.
“Does the spirit forecast the future?” I asked.
“Well it depends upon who the spirit is. Some do and some don’t.” Kiran answered.
“What if. Only hypothesising, of course. What if the spirit refuses to leave?” I asked again.
“The spirit will sit on your head, break it and eat your brains. Unless of course it happens to be a male spirit. Kiran will simply shoo it away.” joked Pradip, and then taking a serious sombre tone said “And the–e–e–n the spirit shall let out a wail….woo…ooo…ooo.”
“Stop it Pradip..” It was Nimmi angry at Pradip for being so inconsiderate.
“What’s wrong with it? I was just creating the atmosphere for your planned–shit” retorted Pradip.

Just then a fierce banging was heard at the door.
“That must be Abhishek. He is late as usual.” said Kiran looking out the window. She was back in form, obviously, relieved at the interruption.
Abhishek had been upto something big. He refused to come to my house that day and strongly put me off when I tried to get the reason off him. Possibly he was dating a girl that day.
The doorbell rang followed by further banging on the door. I opened the door to let Abhishek in. He was smiling his toothy smile.
“What happened?” I asked, “Robbed a bank?”
“Nah. Rajiv’s dad has given permission to go to his farmhouse at Ashoknagar.” He explained. “We can all spend the weekend there. He spoke to Mr Ghosh the caretaker in my presence.”
A loud hurrah went up from the inmates of my drawing room. We had been waiting for such an opportunity.
“Hey. This is truly a godsend. Why don’t we do a planchet at the farmhouse? It would be real interesting?” asked Nimmi.
“Yeah. That’s a good idea. It surely will be very quiet out there.” I supported.
After some discussion, it was decided that we shall start the next day after lunch. Pradip sat silently without comment.
“Come with us Pradip.” I asked.
“No. I would not like to involve myself with things I don’t believe in” he answered.
“Come on” piped in Suman, by now fully awake “You need not do any planchets but at least you could enjoy the place. I heard from Rajiv that it is a very beautiful place.”
After a lot of cajoling, Pradip too decided to come with us, on condition that he be made medium.
“But why would you like to be a medium?” I asked him.
“To prove you weak brained fools what rubbish it all is.”
I couldn’t help but smile.

Next afternoon we all crammed up in Abhishek’s old jalopy, all seven of us. Nimmi’s brother Asif too had joined us. Abhishek was driving. The sky was overcast when we started and by the time we reached the national highway it was three thirty. We reached the farmhouse at about five that evening.
It was a cool day. The caretaker Mr Ghosh knew me from before and smiled a warm welcome.
“Your stay upto tomorrow evening is arranged. Just let me know fifteen minutes before you would like to take your dinner” he said “Ramu shall show you where you are being put up and shall also take your bags. Enjoy yourselves”
The farmhouse was built on an area of about twenty hectares. About five of this was devoted to a small pond which was used to raise fish. The house itself was a two–storey simple construction, with a large terrace in the front leading to a large hall, which you had to enter through french windows on the ground floor. At the back there was the kitchen and two bathrooms. On the west attached to the hall were two bedrooms with attached baths. On the floor above was a corridor in the center flanked by four bedrooms two on either side. Each bedroom opened to long balconies on either side of the house. Tables and chairs made of cane were set up on these balconies overlooking the woods that encircled the farmhouse on three sides.
The house was simply but tastefully decorated. Neat cotton curtains were up on the windows. The whole inside had whitewashed walls and simple furniture made of locally available teakwood. Local handicrafts were placed all across the house at every vantage corner or windowsill. Hand woven mattresses were laid out on the floors giving the interiors a rustic look.
The house and the pond apart, the whole area was landscaped to portray a wooded area. Lots of trees had been planted and three paths ran across the area. One to the pond, another to the main gate and a third to the extreme east corner of the area which housed the caretaker and a couple of servants. The paths were lined with small flowering shrubs with flowers, which gave a sweet light scent.
After a quick freshening up, we went out for a walk into the neighbouring woods. The woods were basically man made woods that were planted over a period of time. Parts of the woods had a symmetry as to the plantation whereas the other parts simply looked unkempt giving the appearance of a self developed tropical forest. We went in through a dust path leading into the woods. The woods seemed to be preparing itself for the night. A wild breeze was blowing across making a swishing sound as it passed through the tree leaves. Birds were returning back to their roosts. We spotted some deer which took off immediately on catching our scent. A variety of smells and sounds surrounded us. Gradually as the evening started to set in, the crickets started to give off the peculiar sound they make, which started to grow louder with each passing minute.
We returned back to the house by seven thirty by which time it had become quite dark and the crickets had started a regular concert reaching a timeless continuous crescendo. The house was dimly lit with only one lamp on the terrace. The whole area had become dark by then and the building stood out like a demon guarding a colossus cave behind it. Inside the house the lighting was comfortable, with a chandelier in the center radiating the light through its crystal pieces and lamps on each wall accentuating the light in the corners where the chandelier light could not reach.
We asked Mr Ghosh to set dinner at eight and decided to set the planchet later on the terrace after dinner.

At about ten we sat down with the planchet on the terrace. A rug was placed on the terrace and a small table was placed at the center of the rug with the planchet placed over it. A small cork piece was used as the concentration block. The light on the terrace was switched off which made the light in the hall fall out softly through the french windows onto the terrace, enough for us to recognise each other and read the letters on the planchet board.
Asif would be the scribe for this session. We placed pillows on the terrace near the table for comfort and all six of us sat around it with our index fingers on the cork block. Pradip had started to meditate on some long dead person.

An hour passed. Then another started to pass.
At about ten minutes to midnight there was a rapid movement on the planchet. We could barely keep our fingers on the cork.
“I have come” said Asif with a slightly squeaky voice. We realised he had followed the cork.
“Would you like to reveal yourself?” I asked.
“No” said the spirit.
“Are you male or female?” someone asked.
“Female” spelt the spirit.
“Will you answer our questions?” Abhishek asked.
“Yes.”
“Did you become a spirit a long time back?” asked Suman.
“No” answered the spirit.
“Will there be a good monsoon this year?” asked Kiran.
“Yes” the spirit replied
“Will I get through my exams this summer?” asked Nimmi.
“Yes” came the answer.
“What will be the outcome of the next cricket match?” asked Abhishek.
No answer.
“Are you there?” he asked sceptically.
No answer.
After a few more tries, we realised it was useless. The spirit had gone. We wanted to start it again, when Pradip started laughing and started calling us a bunch of jokers. I realised that he had played a prank on us.
“What’s the big joke?” cried Nimmi.
“All this is sheer nonsense.” said Pradip “You all thought that it was a spirit that had come and answered your questions but it was a simple thing of my finger pushing the cork to what I had in mind. Don’t worry Nimmi you will pass your exams.” He went into peals of laughter. “You know why I call it useless? I had thought of my mother the whole time we sat goofing here. She is very well back home–alive.”
This was in very bad taste for us believers and we knew we should have left Pradip at home. Disappointed, we broke up for the night and went up to our rooms.

I am an early riser and the next morning I awoke to see Pradip sitting on the terrace with a forlorn look and a pink piece of paper clenched in his hand.
“What happened Pradip?” I asked.
He simply handed me the telegramme.
“MOTHER EXPIRED 11:45PM LAST NIGHT, RETURN SOON – DAD” the telegramme read.

Nimmi passed her examination and yes the monsoons were very good that year.