Wiccan Woman on a Mission to Protect Women From Brutal Witch Hunts [View all]

For Ipsita Roy Chakraverti, the world of the paranormal and metaphysical is not some make-believe hocus pocus, or the stuff that scripts sensational television drama. It is her life's work. A popular Wicca, or witch in lay terms, she not only administers Wiccan ways of healing, but has also made it her mission to travel to remote villages across India, especially where innocent women are declared witches and then murdered, to dispel myths about "witchcraft". "Being a Wicca is very different from the conventional perceptions that people have of spell-spewing women, who are up to no good, bringing the scourge of disease, famines and loss on people and communities," she emphasises.

The daughter of a diplomat, Chakraverti spent her early years in Canada and the US. Her tryst with the world of the Wicca began when she was accepted into a select group of women called the Society for the Study of Ancient Cultures and Civilizations in London. She was with them for three years and finally chose to follow Wicca as her religion. In a news report she has commented, "It started as an academic curiosity. [...] Wicca includes both scientific facts and old lore. We studied Carl Jung and Friedrich Nietzsche because Wicca means studying various layers of the human mind."

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