A fortune-teller who reads lips!
Gitanjali Sharma

NIRMALA Sewani made her first prediction when she was 13. She told her 15-year-old neighbour in Jaipur that she would soon run away from home. And a week later the prophecy came true, much to the discomfiture of this intuitive predictor, who was accused of not only having prior information about the plan but also of masterminding it. "But," laughs the 40-year-old Nirmala, "this incident only strengthened my belief in myself and my intuition."

This fortune-teller has been predicting the future by listening to the voice of the person concerned. She says that she uses no other input to make the predictions, except her strong intuitive powers. Of course, to back her intuition she acquired formal knowledge of palmistry, astrology and voice analysis. She started her practice in 1989 and now this much sought after soothsayer, whose long list of clientele includes big names in the business and film industry, literary world and politics, runs offices in Jaipur and Delhi.

According to her, while astrology employs mathematics to determine the position of the planets, the act of interpreting their influence on human beings is an art that has room for error. Stressing the role of intuition in predicting the future, Nirmala asserts that astrological readings, which ideally should be based on the time of conception, can be about 85 per cent correct. Placing palmistry still lower to astrology for accuracy, as the lines of the hands keep changing, this postgraduate in sociology and philosophy vouches for the technique of decoding voice vibrations, which, she says, can help her make predictions that are 92 to 99 per cent correct. But why are the findings not 100 per cent reliable? "Because I am no God and no method is foolproof," Nirmala is quick to shoot back. Moreover, she confides, inaccuracies can creep in if she is tired and somebody is forcing her to make predictions. Deciphering the voice, she divulges, involves both mathematics as well as intuition. The vibrations, which are like figures and mirror the subconscious mind, have to be put together to ascertain the personality type. Intuition helps fix the picture of the future, based on the present.

Though a firm believer in destiny, Nirmala asserts that you can modify your future. Occult, according to her, works like medicine to reduce and neutralise the negativity. "The universe is made up of positive and negative energy. So, with the help of tantra, mantra and yantra you can increase the positive forces and decrease the negative ones. So, if a person is destined to tie the knot at the age of 42 years, you can bring forward the marriage to 24 with occult power. Likewise, the effect of a serious accident in the offing can be nullified."

Claiming to be the only woman occultist in the country who performs as many as 67 kinds of havans, Nirmala says she prefers the science of the occult for it can be of immense benefit to society. Winner of the Bharat Nirman Award for excelling in the occult, she regularly performs pujas and havans and even advocates gems to her clients. These remedial measures may not completely ward off the problem but certainly bring relief, she maintains.

Though admitting that her predictions are the daya of Ganpati, this fortune-teller likes to sharpen her intuition by meditating for at least eight to ten hours a day and keeping maun vrat during the four navratras.

Vaastu is another subject which she dwells on to tackle the problems of her clients. She, however, scoffs at the blind acceptance and craze of people for so-called charms such as the Laughing Buddha and wind chimes, considered auspicious by other cultures. "Bamboo shoots may be held propitious by the Chinese, but I would recommend the presence of a kaddi patta tree in the house for health, harsingar for wealth and mogra for mental peace."

Currently, this occultist is doing research in Indian classical music and mantras. Classical music, she believes, is as pious as the mantras. She is taking time out of her schedule to learn music in order to discover its mystical powers.