James Flynn

I always lookout for bizarre and offbeat stories, they are a great source of entertainment for me.

A lot of what I read is a load of tat however, and isn't really worth a mention.

But recently I found a story that I remember reading a while back about an indian guy named Prahlad Jani, who claims to survive on very little, and has been doing so for the last seventy years.

Well, I say survived on very little, what I should say is that this man claims he has survived on nothing but sunlight for seventy years.

Quite a bold claim I think you would agree. Some would say a ridiculous claim.

Prahrad claims that a goddess named Amba sustains his wellbeing.

But for some reason I thought there might be something to this story. I don't know why but it didn't seem on the same level as some other ridiculous stuff floating around the net, so I looked into it a little.

After a little research on this story I found out that Prahlad Jani was observed around 2010 by a team of 30 doctors in an indian hospital in the state of Gujarat. He was apparently watched for 15 days in a hospital room under cameras, and the project was financed by the indian defence institute of physiology and allied sciences (DIPAS).

Sounds very legit doesn't it? It certainly seemed to have some credibility to it, so with eagerness I read on....

Doctors in india are thinking Prahlad may gain nutrients from sunlight, and apparently authorities are eager to find out about this man's abilities to somehow harness energy from sunlight for the benefit of soldiers out in the field, astronauts and people trapped in natural disasters.

Good thinking. It certainly would come in handy for all of the above, let alone put an end to world hunger.

My initial thoughts when hearing about this assessment was "why did they only assess him for 15 days?!

Ok, I suppose it's pretty well known that you can only survive for around two weeks without water so perhaps it was based around that, but why not just keep him in there for about two months and really settle it?

It's very impressive that somebody can go 15 days without food or water, I certainly wouldn't want to try it, but it still leaves you kind of unsatisfied.

This was puzzling me and annoying me, but as I researched this more, it was revealing itself more and more as a bit of a joke.

Firstly, Prahlad was allowed to gargle water and take baths out of sight of the cameras. He was allowed to wander out of sight of the cameras several times which doesn't really help the validity of the claim.

It's also worth mentioning that during an earlier study of this man in 2003 consisting of ten days, it was found that his weight slightly dropped, raising doubts about his seventy year claim.

Also, Dr Sudhir Shah, the man propelling this story into the limelight is a member of "Jain Doctors Federation", a kind of medical group who follow religious values and like to see things from a very "spiritual" angle......

Fair enough, but considering the fact that Prahlad Jani claims a goddess named Amba sustains him, you have to wonder whether this Dr Shah's judgement would be slightly clouded by religious zeal?

My main question about all this is why?

What does a person gain from staging a hoax?

There was no cash prize for proving that you have survived for years on sunlight alone, so why do it?

Attention? Boredom? Or is religion somehow playing an important role in all this?

Let me know what you think, do you think this guy is just after attention? Or do you think he believes he has not eaten for seventy years?

I always love to get comments on stuff like this so let me know what you think.....

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