During a long winter morning walk inside the jungle, the medicinal healer stopped walking at a place etched in his memory. Gesturing to zig-zag, tall, dense bamboo clumps quite unlike the surrounding foliage of trees and shrubs, he said, “See, there is the presence of god here. You will keep going in circles” if you go inside “but not find a way out. Then you will have to pray, ‘Oh god, please get me out of here. Forgive me if I have done anything wrong.’ Soon you will find a way out. We call him Chedda!” “Earlier, he continued, “Our family owned cows. I or my brothers used to take them to graze and let them loose. If we were late, we would always bring back the dairy cows first. Many-a-time, we would not find the cows left behind. We could see their footprints but, despite endless efforts, not them. So we prayed, ‘God, I am tired now. It is late …’ Then suddenly, somehow, the cows appeared from somewhere,” saying thus, he smiled sheepishly, conscious of the non-adivasi presence in his midst. In disbelief, we narrated this story to an adivasi artist. His reply left us stunned, “Last week, my younger brother did not return home. Despite our search for two days, we couldn’t find him. Some told us that they last saw him near Chedda’s home. He returned on the third day from there but couldn’t remember what exactly happened.” “Chedda has always been like this since the beginning,” the healer added, “He is one of the most terrifying and dangerous deities! He needs a lot of offerings.”
