CHENNAI : The temperature drops and a gust of wind brushes past as one steps onto Blue Cross Road, Besant Nagar. Blanketed by dense foliage, the winding path is now lined with street lights and the occasional creaking of swaying branches from towering banyan trees. But when night falls, the narrow lane is rumoured to turn sinister, with restless spirits, poltergeists, and formless apparitions taking hold.
For some, it’s the perfect setting for a horror film; for others, it’s a spine-chilling ride under the dim, flickering street lights. Local lore claims that at the stroke of midnight, the spirits of the restless dead emerge, searching for their next victim. As the bravest, or perhaps the most foolhardy commuters race through this road in the dead of night, many have reported the classic signs of a haunting: flickering street lights, frequent accidents, eerie shadows, vehicles mysteriously stalling, and the distant howling of dogs.
With Shiv Nadar School on one side and the Besant Memorial Animal Dispensary on another, this winding road has been marked as a scenic spot on Google Maps. Over the years, the area has also made it to numerous ‘the city’s top 10 most haunted areas’ lists, and a frequented ‘suicide spot’. When CE visited this area, it was hushed and isolated, apart from a few stray residents exercising during their daily evening walks, joggers on the move, and speedy motorists. A shaky couple on a two-wheeler was spotted with the female rider telling her pillion, “idhu andha Blue Cross Road ahh, dai fast-ah polaam!”
“Eight years ago, my brother said he saw a black human figure and something black near the road linking to Raj Bhavan,” says a jogger. While he adds that he has not experienced paranormal activity, he admits to having heard several spooky tales. For dancer and corporate employee Ajay Filo, goosebumps would appear as soon as he entered the street. Since 2016, the dancer has been roaming here and at the Madras Christian College with his friends, searching for a solid semblance of the ghost stories. “There are street lights here now, but at that time, it was a horribly scary place. We heard stories like the lights of vehicles passing through the way will suddenly turn off.”
A few residents admitted to having never heard of spooky tales and laughed off the idea of spirits, and ghosts. Another passerby, who has lived in the area for over 20 years, says she has not heard of any ghost stories, but adds that many used to take their lives in a nearby lake. “It was a dead lake with no vegetation, no oxygen,” she explains. A few cited local accounts of a murder years ago, where a woman was killed by a few men. Donning full white, the victim is said to walk these streets, a local told us.
Abdu Salam, owner of a shop on the main road, says, “I have not experienced this but I remember a few years ago, three boys came running out of the street and left their scooter because they saw a figure running back and forth on the road.” In a time before street lights filled the area, Anand Ganesh, who has lived here for 55 years, as a child, recalls local deity stones set up here and women worshipping them. “This was also a spot where people came to die; as a kid, I remember seeing bodies hanging from the trees.”
In films, oral histories, folktales, and grandmother’s tales, banyan trees and abandoned houses have long been touted as the dwelling area of ghosts. Characterised by their dangling axial roots, and shadowy grooves, they provide shade during the day and cast shadows at night. As rumours go, the banyan tree on Blue Cross Road is said to hold swaying bodies at night.
An official from the Besant Nagar memorial chalks this lore to a local worship practice by the area’s cattle herders. “After a calf is born, the plasma is hung up on the banyan tree as an offering to local deities. Perhaps, that created the illusion of hanging bodies.” The official adds that often, accounts suggest that street lights begin blinking as people take a sharp left towards Fourth Avenue.
However, beyond ghosts, a passerby, under anonymity, said, the scarier fact is that Blue Cross Road is notorious for frequent accidents, chain-snatching, and cases of thievery. A hotbed for crime, the passerby, adds that no police station would admit to the high number of crimes in the area.
Whether or not one subscribes to a belief in spirits, Blue Cross Road, over the years, is a testament to our love for ghost tales, the passing down of legends, and of course, it has attracted the unknowing, the young, and ghostbuster-types. As we leave, a passerby, Kabali tells us, “Forget spirits, the real ghosts that walk the earth are humankind.”
(Inputs from Sreelakshmi S Nair)