The haunted Koh-e-Chiltan in Quetta – beauty with a legend

The haunted Koh-e-Chiltan in Quetta – beauty with a legend

Our motherland has been bestowed with my beautiful locations. The Almighty has blessed us with a country that has mesmerizing geographic and topographic features. Not only are the Northern Areas gifted with splendid mountainous scenery, the south western province of Balochistan also boasts of such landscape with remarkable beauty of its own.

Among the many striking mountains in the Balochistan province, there is Koh-e-Chiltan. The stunning mountain is 3,194 metres (10,479 ft) high. It is located in the provincial capital, Quetta. It is the third highest peak in Quetta and the fifth highest in Balochistan.

Koh-e-Chiltan or Chiltan Mount not only an appealing it is also, to the surprise of many, considered haunted. The mountain is a much talked about affair in the nearby region. Many locals have quite a few tales to tell about the mountain. Although the accounts of a few differ from others, it is widely and generally believed that the mountain is indeed haunted and is not considered a safe place to visit alone.

 The name of the mountain Chiltan or Chehel-Tan actually means ‘forty bodies’, it has been derived Persian/Balochi. The story related to the mountain is about a couple that lived many years ago in the vicinity of the mountain. It is said that the couple had married, and were not blessed with an offspring for many years after their marriage. As time passed the couple grew desperate for a child and started resorting to methods other than natural.

After they were left totally helpless, they decided to take help from a holy man. They went to the holy man asking for advice and wanted him to pray in their favor. The holy man, however, told them that there was nothing he could do since he could not change what Allah had decided for them. On the other hand the holy man’s son, who was also learned in these ways, felt sympathy towards the couple. He was confident that he could help them and decided to perform a ritual. He told the man’s wife to sit in front of him and then he cast forty pebbles in her lap. Subsequently she had forty children, but the couple was still unhappy as they could not provide for all forty children. The husband cold-heartedly decided to leave 39 of their children on the Chehel Tan summit, and keep one offspring with them.

After some time, the mother of the children who had been living a life of guilt and remorse decided to head back to the summit and gather the remains of their children whom they had once abandoned. As she reached the top of the mountain, she was astounded to see that all of her children were still alive. She was ecstatic and decided to run back to her husband and tell him about this miracle. As she went home, she could not find her husband so she decided to take her fortieth offspring to Chehel Tan so he could meet his brothers and sisters.

In a bizarre twist, the mother left her fortieth child on the peak for one night. She was sure that all of her children would be there the next morning. When she returned the day after, she found out that there was no one there. It is said that her other 39 children had carried off the one offspring she had decided to raise. None of the children were ever seen again by their mother.

It is still widely believed that the forty babies still haunt the Chehel Tan or Koh-e-Chiltan.

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Posted by Fouad Ashraf on Oct 22 2011. Filed under Pakistan. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0. You can leave a response or trackback to this entry