Food for the Gods

The land and the gods were thirsty. To water the land, and to control the temperamental waters of the Kosi River in Bihar Province, the Indian Government planned the world's highest dam (730 ft.). But many a simple villager thought the plans for the dam would simply sharpen the thirst of the gods for human blood.

Bihar villagers remembered a pre-Hindu superstition that the gods require human sacrifice whenever any major building is under construction. The faith of the Thugs, worshipers of Kali, Goddess of Destruction, who thought their goddess was the more pleased the more people they strangled in her name, had never quite died out. In the last 30 years about a dozen people have been sentenced in Bihar, Bengal and Madras on charges of offering human sacrifices.

When Bihar villagers heard of the plans for the Kosi dam, they locked their children indoors. Last week their schools were closed, for no pupils would attend. Bazaars and fairs shut down. Panicky villagers feared that 108 children would be kidnaped for sacrifice.* They picked 108 as the proper figure because that is sacred to Hindus. Rama, for instance, one of the incarnations of Vishnu, the Protector, offered his wife Sita 108 lotuses, each with 108 petals.

* In Bombay in 1929, rumors that children were being kidnaped for sacrifice on a Baroda bridge led to riots that killed 149.

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