Lights, Camera, Ghosts!

In 2007, Akshay Kumar and Priyadarshan flagged off the Bhool Bhulaiyaa franchise. It spawned a standalone sequel in 2022, and two years later, returned with a third instalment to complete a hat-trick of hits. Amidst speculations about part four, the actor-director duo quietly wrapped up another horror comedy.

Bhoot Bangla, the big Bollywood release in April, has been shot across cities, even continents, from Mumbai and Jaipur to Chennai, Kochi, and London. The climax plays out in a bhootiya palace put up by art director Sabu Cyril in Hyderabad’s Ramoji Film City, which itself has the reputation of being one of India’s most haunted places. According to local lore, the sprawling film studio where epic extravaganzas like Baahubali, RRR and Kalki 2898 AD have come to life is built on a battlefield, overrun by the restless souls of soldiers who died fighting under the nizams and now keep security guards up all night.

While historians debunk this as fallacy and fantasy, actors insist they have heard footsteps when alone, felt cold drafts in closed rooms, seen mysterious words pop up in mirrors. Singers talk about whispers in their ears, technicians sigh over props shifting inexplicably, chandeliers crashing to the ground. One light man asserted that someone had been trying to push him off the parapet. Even filmmaker Suparn S. Varma, who has since helmed The Family Man and Rama Naidu, claims that during the shoot of Acid Factory in 2009, he shared his hotel room with a ghost — amicably, for a month.

All of us have encountered many pyasi aatmas thirsting for revenge on-screen, but Rajniesh Duggall confides that he met a bhookha aatma while filming Vikram Bhatt’s supernatural horror, 1920. The shoot was at Allerton Castle, a 19th century Victorian Gothic manor in North Yorkshire said to be haunted by the spirit of a carpenter killed there. Some rooms gave off cold vibes, and 1920’s executive producer once returned from the washroom distraught and dishevelled, screaming that he had been accosted by a ghost.

The owner of the castle was a doctor who looked to be in his nineties, living alone since his wife had passed. Invited to lunch on the first day, he declined brusquely — then appeared, piled his plate high, and left without a word. He returned four times for a refill, and was back every day, for every meal, reed thin. No one ever dared voice the obvious question.

Among Bollywood’s current stars, Rajkummar Rao has always loved ghost stories and, growing up, believed every one he heard was true. Even when he knew better, the fascination remained. But while watching Paranormal Activity, he never imagined he would one day star in an Indian found-footage horror film.

Ragini MMS was partly inspired by a 19-year-old girl’s true-life experience and shot in a dilapidated bungalow in Dahanu, 110 kilometres from Mumbai. Rajkummar admits that all through the shoot, he was “gripped by a constant fear of something ominous happening”. Nothing actually happened to him — but co-producer Tannujj Garg remembers frantic calls throughout the 25-day shoot, with cast and crew insisting something wasn’t right with the house.

But someone did see a ghost for real, allegedly, and still shivers at the memory.

Hindi film buffs would remember Ranjeeta Kaur from Pati Patni Aur Woh and Satte Pe Satta. During the shoot of her debut film Laila Majnu, she was staying at her sister’s Juhu apartment when she woke one night with the creeping sensation of being watched. As her eyes flew open, she saw a middle-aged gentleman in an old-fashioned suit and hat, a cigar clenched between his teeth, standing with one foot on her bed, the other on the floor.

For long moments, Ranjeeta stared, transfixed and terrified. He stared back impassively. Then, even as she wondered what he would do next, he disappeared.

The sisters moved out soon after. They later learnt that a woman had been shot in that flat.

Was Ranjeeta’s late-night visitor the murderer? No one will ever know — unless he appears again, and this time, speaks up.