Every 90s kid loves The Jungle Book and of course Mowgli. But did you know, that a real-life Mowgli exists?
A six-year-old baby boy was spotted with a pack of wolves by a group of hunters in the dense forest of Bulandshahr district, Uttar Pradesh. It appeared that the boy had been adopted and raised by the wolves.
There have been similar incidents in the history where human children were raised by animals in the wild. Such children are known as ¡®feral children¡¯. The term feral child is used for a human kid who lives in the wilderness.
The hunters deemed it unnatural and decided to extract the feral child from there and take him back to civilisation. They smoked the cave and had to kill the female wolf to capture the boy, whom they took to the Sikandra Mission Orphanage near Agra. He was named Sanichar there.
Photo from a newspaper
Feral children often not only lack basic social skills but also have trouble walking straight. It has been documented that Father Erhardt observed, ¡°He cannot talk, and though undoubtedly 'Pagal' (imbecile or idiotic), still shows sign of reason, and sometimes actual shrewdness¡±
Sanichar was not the only wolf child found at that time. There were cases of four other wolf children found in various parts of India around that time, and many more cases of feral children surfaced over the years.
Sanichar growled and grunted like a wolf, walked on four, ate raw meat, sharpened his teeth by gnawing on bones like an animal, though he wasn¡¯t mute, he only made animal voices. People of the orphanage tried to work patiently with the boy and gradually he started eating normally but did not speak anything.
Sanichar lived a short life and died at the age of 34. He lived in the orphanage his entire life, showing little improvement. He was able to stand, walk, dressed properly, started eating from the plate but always sniffed the food before eating.
Sanichar in his lifetime only took one human habit - he started smoking and became a chain smoker and it is speculated that he died because of Tuberculosis in 1895.?