Girl claims to have married a cobra

Girl claims to have got married to cobra

BY AKSHAYA KUMAR SAHOO

Bhubaneswar, Nov. 8: It may appear like a fairytale of the good old days, but a girl in Orissa’s Malkangiri district on the borders of Andhra Pradesh and Chhatishgarh claims to have got married to snake.
She insists to live with the reptile although her life.
Apart from different parts of the state, a large number of people from Andhra and Chhatishgarh are thronging the girl’s village everyday to have a glimpse of her.
A section of Oriya newspapers reported on Saturday that a few days back Kusum (15) of Kaliaguda tribal village about 60 km from the district headquarters of Malkangiri, had gone to take bathe in the river Saveri nearby. While bathing she found a cobra getting wrapped around her.
In a bid to save herself, the panic-stricken Kusum shook the reptile off and fell unconscious after that. After she regained consciousness, the teen-aged girl told her father Bhagaban Nayak and family that she had to marry the cobra as God wished so.
Initially, her family members and villagers dismissed Kusum’s statement and even laughed at her. But to their surprise, they all started sighting the cobra often, the newspapers reported.
Firm on her stance, Kusum kept her demand on and insisted that her marriage to be solemnised with the cobra.
In an attempt to cure her daughter, Kusum's father first took her to a medical doctor and later to a witchdoctor.
The witchdoctor prescribed an expensive, rigorous rituals-laden puja which was performed with all seriousness but to no avail. Nor the medical treatment did yield any result. Despite all efforts, the 15-year-old girl refused to back of from her demand and even claimed that she had got married to the cobra in her dreams.
Finally her father Bhagaban appears to have reconciled with her daughter’s desire.
“May be it is the wish of the Almighty" he says.
As people came in large numbers to see the cobra and the girl, the reptile has disappeared but Kusum says that the cobra keeps on appearing to her in her dreams and meets her on the river banks.
The newspapers, quoting some old tribal men and priests, said there is a Cobra-God on the banks of the river Saveri and He saves people from drowning in the river.