Annabelle is a passe — Kolkata has a new favourite spooky toy. She is bald, she is green, and she is a social media sensation.
Meet Ganji Chudail, a name that Instagrammers are well aware of, thanks to her meme icon status. But this time, she is in Kolkata, ready to grace your bedroom in a spookier-than-ever doll avatar.
Manufactured by Oye Happy, the voodoo doll-esque toy is now available on Instamart, and Kolkatans feel she is here to stay!
‘It can be a great gift for pranks’
Annabelle had a creepy Victorian dress. Chucky had his murderous overalls. But Ganji Chudail? She’s just out here in a simple red outfit, looking like she was cursed halfway through doing her laundry. Her unsettling stare and bloodied mouth adds the spook to her look. But for the bravehearts, she’s less of a “paranormal entity” and more of a “strict school principal who caught you bunking class”.
Home chef Debjani Chatterjee Alam recently got a jumpscare while ordering ice cream on Instamart. “I was ordering some groceries and ice cream, when this chudail made an entry. I was shocked! I have seen such weird things being sold online, like cow dung cakes, but this was bizarre. I will probably never buy it for myself, but it can be a great prank if gifted to someone,” she said.
‘Don’t want to ruin sleep’
Her name alone is a masterpiece — Ganji Chudail. Unlike Annabelle, who requires a glass case and a whole museum exhibit, Ganji Chudail needs no containment. She just needs a quiet corner to silently keep a watch on you. But for post-graduate student Meghna Saha, it is creepy. “I can’t imagine buying something like this. No matter where we keep her, she is going to freak us out. With something like this in the house, we cannot sleep.”
‘It looks like a voodoo doll’
For IT professional Supratim Nandi, Ganji Chudail looks like a voodoo doll. “It looks like a cursed doll. Having it may make me fall into trouble. Imagine I keep it in the house and someone spots it without knowing the context. Anyway, for outsiders [from West Bengal] we [Bengalis] do black magic,” he said.
‘It is offensive’
Toddler moms do not consider it for their children. “I don’t want to instill fear into my baby at this young age,” said Sayantani Mukherjee, mother to a two-year-old son.
While memes make you laugh, they sometimes also have an underlying problematic undertone. And here, Ganji Chudail is “a derogatory view on a woman”, feels Mukherjee. “The name itself is offensive. It is basically calling a bald woman ugly. Someone evil. That’s something very sad”
Priced at Rs 699, Ganji Chudail arrives in 10 minutes to your home. Whether they stay or not depends on you. In this case, spook lies in the eyes of the beholder.