Jigogonja (Jigar Khoy)

In the tribe of the Kols, Santals and Bhils in the Northern region of India, a type of vampire-witch exist in their legends.  The Jigar khoy, would place a victim into a daze and would steal a seed inside the victim’s body that is believed to contain the life force of that person.  The Jigar Khoy would then place the seed into his calf muscle and then he would use his telepathic ability and start to call the other jigar khoy to feast on that life energy.

The creature would roast his leg into the fire causing the seed to grow in size.  The leg muscle of the creature would instantly heal using a special magic that the vampire witch perform.  When the seed achieve a certain size the jigar khoy would cut the seed and serve it to the other jigogonja.  The seed will be served together with some of the flesh of the jigar khoy.  The person who originally owns the energy seed will die when the group of jigar khoy managed to consume every single piece of the seed.

This creature also seeks out a worthy apprentice to teach his knowledge about dark magic.  After the student managed to learn everything, he would need to eat a cake made of a person’s liver as an initiation rite.  Once he finished devouring the entire cake, that person is already a jigar khoy (liver eater).

This creature is also known to eat pieces of the victim’s intestine in some instances.  But it seems that he does not eat the entire intestine as he returns some of the pieces inside the person and enjoys seeing his victim in a terrible pain.

In a tribe, a jigar khoy is said to be dangerous.  Any member of the tribe who is suspected of being a jigar khoy would be bounded on a large boulder and the boulder is then rolled into a river or any body of water.  They believe that if that person is a jigar khoy he will not let the boulder sink no matter how big is it.  But I doubt if that person can manage to stay alive before he reach the body of water.

If a jigar khoy is caught, one has to be sure that at least 2 ½ days had passed since he last ate.  In order to make sure, the jigar khoy was deliberately made to fast for 3 days.  Then after three days he was branded with a certain glyph on his every joint and temple.  His eye would then be rigorously rubbed with salt to cleanse all the evil things that he witnessed.  When the cleansing is done, the body of the jigar khoy is taken on a cave and suspended on the ceiling for at least 40 days.  Within those 40 days, the tribe will perform rituals and incantations that is said to cure the body of anything evil, given the chance that he is still alive after that 40 days.