THIS IS A TRUE STORY

It was a very dark night without moonlight. My younger brother Rashid and myself aged 12 and 13 respectively were travelling on foot in the pitch dark on a narrow dirt path leading to town of Kharian. Due to some emergency our parents told us to go to Kharian in spite of the fact that it was too late. Our elder brothers were not available at that time.

Our parents were very religious and godly persons and had full trust in God. We were trained not to be afraid of dark and face the dangers with courage. More over the people of that area were used to the darkness, since there was no electricity in those days. However, nobody would try to go out into dark unless it was really necessary. Especially, if you are alone in the darkness it is very scary and you need a lot of courage to overcome the fear.

For example there was a guy who was coming back to Tehal from Kharian. He started little late and by the time he reached near Tehal it was too dark. Before entring Tehal you have to cross a small river (kassi) which usually remains dry except for the rainy days. It was about 25 feet deep. When the guy reached near the kassi and thought of going down in deep darkness he was so scared that he wouldn’t dare to go down. At the same time he saw something on the other side of the kassi which looked like an elephant to him. He saw that the “elephant” was frequently moving his ears and tail. Crossing the kassi was tough already. To face an “elephant “ just after that was like inviting the death. So he did not dare to cross the kassi and preferred to spend the whole night sitting there and praying for his life. In the morning when the darkness subsided, he looked at the ”elephant” carefully. There was no elephant. It was actually a big bush, which looked like an elephant to him in the dark, an illusion.

On that particular night when we were getting ready to set out for Kharian journey on foot. Our mother prepared two torches for both of us consisted of some spongy material socked in kerosene oil and tied on one end of the sticks. This was due to a precautionary measure to keep the wild animals away from us just in case. The Pubbi forest was not far from that place. The torches worked perfectly till the end.

At our departure our parents said some prayers to God for our safe journey and we set out for the proposed mission carrying torches in our hands. The range of light coming from our torches was limited to few yards only and the presence of the torches was making it more difficult for us to see in the darkness. On the other hand our torches could be seen from many miles away.

After walking a few furlongs on an uneven path and passing nearby bushes and what not, we reached the Kassi, the most dangerous part of 3-mile journey. The possibility of wild animals or any other hidden danger was likely to be more deep inside the kassi. When we reached in the middle/bottom of the Kassi I turned my head to the right and left in a useless effort to look for anything suspicious, wild animal or something. The Pubbi forest was on the right, which also was the source of Kassi. I could not see anything because of the darkness. The only way to know the presence of any wild animal was, when either the wild beast had already jumped on us or caught us from behind silently. The only protection and defense we had was two sticks with a small “firepower” at the end of the sticks.

Soon we were out of the kassi safe and sound. We were still surrounded by the darkness in complete silence with no signs of life in the radius one and a half-mile.

THE UFOs:

Then all of a sudden I noticed a few lights on my left moving with the same speed as ours, at a distance of about 100 yards. I told my younger brother to see to the left. He too was surprised to see them. The lights were not very bright but in the dark they were clearly visible. They were bluish in color. In the dark we could only see the lights, but no other object or person “carrying” those lights was visible to us.

Since the objects (lights) were “walking” in the fields and were not following any designated path, I thought that a theft has taken place in some nearby village and these “people” are looking for the foot prints of the thief with the help of a KHOJI, carrying lanterns in their hands. But it proved to be wrong when all of a sudden the lights swiftly moved up in the air at the height of a medium size tree. Sometimes they will come down and go up again, together or individually.

In the school, we had recently started studying about light (roshni) in our Science period. The teacher was trying to teach us about the reflection and deflection of light (inekas-e-roshni and inetaf-e-roshni). Our Science book used to be in Urdu with Arabic and Farsi terminology. For example, the equivalent of electricity was Al-Barqiat, which looks fazooliat these days.

After recalling this basic and incomplete knowledge about the characteristics of light, I assumed that these lights might not be real. Instead this was only the result of some deflection or reflection of our own torches we were carrying and were making multiple images on the screen of our visionary system. But this theory of mine proved to be wrong later on.

As mentioned before, the lights were not keeping the same height. Occasionally they would move up and down. This was a clear indication that there was somebody or some force to keep those lights moving. We tried our best to figure out what exactly was that, but we could not come to any conclusion. The good news was that they were not bothering us.

Now we were nearing our destination. Soon the Front rows of houses in Sitar Pura and Thathi muhallah were visible. Now we were witnessing another big surprise of our life. The residents of northern part of Kharian town, men, women and children were standing on the roofs of their respective homes. The people were waiting for “all” the mysterious lights coming to their town at midnight. They looked very curious and anxious to find out the secret of these lights and the “aliens” carrying them.

For long time their eyes were glued towards these lights. No one was willing to go to bed unless the mystery of lights was solved.

Now we were very close to the buildings in front of us and could see the people of Sitar Pura more clearly.

We stopped in front of a house of a Kashmiri family, well known to our family. We said assalamo alaikum to them. We were immediately recognized, because of the light coming from our torches. One of the family members shouted, “oh they are the sons of Haji Saheb”. Meantime the other mysterious lights also came to halt at a distance of about 100 yards on our right side. Then pointing to that light they asked us, “Who are those other people”? We told them that they that we did not know. Then I said let me see if I can find out. Saying that I ran very fast towards them to have a closer look. But in a blink of an eye they disappeared and reappeared at a distance of about a mile.

It was very clear after so many witnesses that those lights were real and not the illusion or imagination of two young boys.

About 60 years have passed but I still remember this incident as if it happened only yesterday. What were those UFOs is still a mystery to me. Some suggest that they were the angels sent by god for our protection during the journey. Only God knows better. What say you?  The End.
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