A Murder, A Walk-In Soul, and Astonishing Evidence of Reincarnation: The Case of Jasbir Singh

A walk-in soul references the idea that one spirit can swap places with another spirit who is struggling with physical life. This documented reincarnation story just may prove it to be a true possibility.

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Walk-In Soul - photo by CHUTTERSNAP/Unsplash

The concept of a walk-in soul is complicated — and even scary for some people. If you’re not comfortable or familiar with reincarnation cases, please be warned this might not be the best one to start with. Or jump right in, anyway! I can appreciate an adventurous spirit.

Most reincarnation cases are pretty straightforward. A person dies and then, sometime later their soul is reborn into a new body — usually as a baby. In the case of a walk-in soul, we’re not dealing with a newborn, but a young child or even a full-grown adult. The true story of Jasbir Singh is one such example.

Imagine this rollercoaster of events. Your 3-year-old child has contracted a serious illness and passes away. Hours later, he makes a miraculous recovery, literally coming back to life right in front of you, and with no medical help. There’s only one little problem. His personality and behavior have completely changed. He says he’s not your son. He claims he was the victim of a murder and his soul has merely taken refuge in this body.

Does this sound insane, or even like the plot of a new horror movie? Well, it’s completely true. This a reincarnation case that was documented in great depth, with a vast amount of proof. Documented by a scientist, and in academic books and scientific journals. Read on to learn about the alleged murder and other details of this walk-in soul reincarnation case.

Want to know how long it takes to be reborn? Read my post about that here.

A Boy Comes Back to Life

In the spring of 1954, a little boy in India named Jasbir contracted smallpox and passed away. He had completely stopped breathing, his heart had stopped beating, and his feverish skin had already started turning cold. He was officially considered dead.

The boy’s father reached out to family members to help him bury the body. Because it was so late at night, they decided to postpone it until morning. (Adult bodies in India were generally cremated. However, since he was so young and also had an infectious disease, he would not have been burned.)

Imagine how grateful the boy’s father was that the burial hadn’t taken place yet, when only a few hours later, he noticed his son’s body start to move! It took a few weeks, but shockingly, Jasbir went on to make a full recovery.

Something's Different...

During that time, the boy could barely be roused to drink or eat or speak, but once he healed well enough that he could talk, things took another turn. Jasbir claimed that he was someone else entirely, giving them the name of his “real” father. He asked to be taken to his true home, a village none of them had ever heard of that turned out to be about 20 miles away.

(This, by the way, may not seem very far, but consider this information from Dr. Ian Stevenson. “The isolation of Indian villages from each other cannot be adequately conveyed to Western readers by merely asking them to imagine towns separated by hundreds of miles in the West. There is far more traffic per capita between, say New York and San Francisco than between two villages like Rasulpur and Vehedi, although they are much closer geographically.”)

Jasbir’s Behavior Changes

Jasbir said that he was really Sobha Ram, a grown man who had a wife and children. He also claimed to be Brahmin, meaning that he was at the top of the caste system in India and was used to a particular standard of living. This is significant because, basically, he came from money and the family he found himself in now were more or less peasants.

There is no doubt that Jasbir believed himself to actually be Sobha Ram. He didn’t just make some random statements as a delirious child. For one thing, he committed to this sentiment for the rest of his life. Furthermore, his behavior changed to perfectly reflect his statements. According to some of the interviewed witnesses, his entire personality had changed.

Before the smallpox, Jasbir was a playful kid who was fond of toys. Afterwards, he acted disinterested in games and trinkets. He behaved like an adult trapped in a child’s body — which, of course, is exactly what he claimed to be.

Risking Death Again

Maybe most significant, he was so insistent that he was Brahmin that he nearly risked death for a second time. He refused to eat the food his family prepared, as it did not live up to the standards and beliefs he held. (As an example, while members of other casts are fine with eating meals that have been prepared in earthen containers, a Brahmin insists their food be cooked in metal ones.)

Out of desperation and fear that he might actually starve, Jasbir’s parents provided the ingredients to a kindly neighbor who agreed to prepare his meals in the Brahmin way. This lady had to cook for the kid for over a year and a half before the family could convince Jasbir to eat the food they made!

The Alleged Murder of the Walk-In Soul/Previous Personality

According to Jasbir, when he was Sobha Ram, he had been riding his chariot on his way to a wedding. He’d fallen off and hit his head. This injury killed him before his family could get him to the nearest medical facility.

The plot thickens, though, because he also claimed that he’d only fallen off his chariot because he’d gotten dizzy. The reason he’d gotten dizzy? Because he’d eaten some fruit given to him by a guy who owed him money. He believed the man had poisoned it first as a way of getting out of his debt.

While the homicide aspect was never officially proven, this next part is pretty mind-blowing. The man who Jasbir accused of being a murderer ended up giving Jasbir the money he owed to Sobha Ram (his previous personality). Under normal circumstances, that debt would be voided or in the very least, the money would go to Sobha Ram’s surviving family members, such as his children. While this doesn’t prove guilt or murder necessarily, it does showcase just how much people believed that Jasbir was indeed a walk-in soul — Sobha Ram reborn.

What’s possibly the most important detail about all of this is that Sobham Ram was killed around the same time that Jasbir’s 3-year-old body died of smallpox. What are the odds that a young child would pass away, miraculously come back to life, and then claim to be a person who had died at the same time? Did Sobham Ram’s soul indeed walk in to Jasbir’s body? And if so, what happened to the original soul?

What Happened to the Original Soul When the Walk-In Soul Arrived?

Jasbir claimed that after he (Sobha Ram) died, he transitioned to spirit form and met a holy man. The sadhu guided him to Jasbir’s vacant body, and Sobha Ram basically just did as he was told. (This reminds me a lot of the in-between-lives experiences that are described in the book Five Lives Remembered by Dolores Cannon. Apparently it’s not uncommon for some souls to be instructed on when to go into another body. Other souls are more advanced and thus, have more awareness and choice in the matter.)

The discarnate holy man who guided Sobha Ram continued to stay in touch with him via his dreams throughout Jasbir’s lifetime. He gave him insight and even accurately predicted the future on occasion. This is another pattern I’ve noticed in my research. It seems common for a person who vividly remembers his past life to also develop psychic powers. Joan Grant is an excellent example of this. (Read her autobiography, Far Memory.)

Okay, But What About the First Soul?

But what does this mean for the original soul who inhabited Jasbir’s body before the smallpox incident? Dr. Stevenson states, “I asked Jasbir if he had any idea as to what happened to the mind or personality that had occupied the body of Jasbir… He did not know and nor do I. I have from time to time enquired in the area where he lives about the existence of a child who has claimed that in a previous life he was one Jasbir of a village Rasulpur who died of smallpox at the age of about three; but I have never found any trace of such a child.”

The original soul probably went to the “resting place” or one of the other non-physical planes. I imagine he needed to recuperate before entering physical existence again. To quote the book Seth Speaks, “There is not just one dimension in which nonphysical consciousness resides, any more than there is only one country on your planet or planet within your solar system.”

Still Confused about Walk-In Souls?

Here’s an excerpt from the book Between Death & Life by Dolores Cannon. Hopefully it explains the concept a bit better. I won’t claim to be an expert on the subject. I’m still in the research and processing stages, myself.

“Sometimes there comes a time in an individual’s life when he finds that he truly no longer wishes to be in the physical. He has reached a point where the physical weights and cares have dragged the soul to a level from which it cannot sustain itself. And so the individual is given the option to pass over to the other side. There is then made available the opportunity for an individual on the spirit side to come and inhabit that body. So there would be a mutual exchange exchange of places, so to say. This is very beneficial for both. For you can see the original soul is released to his true home. And that individual on the spirit side is then allowed a vehicle on which to work karma.”

Ruth Montgomery is credited for popularizing the phrase “walk-in soul.” I’ve never read any of her books, but while researching this reincarnation case, I ordered one called Strangers Among Us. I’ll update this post once I’ve finished the book, if I feel it can add significant insight.

More Evidence that Jasbir Had a Walk-In Soul

When Jasbir was around 6 or 7 years old (and after he had been talking about his past life for about 3 years), he spotted someone in his village that he recognized from his previous life. The woman was visiting from the town that Jasbir said he used to live in. She was quick to tell her husband about the boy’s reincarnation claims.

Soon Jasbir was reunited with the Tyagi family that Sobha Ram once belonged to. They were able to confirm many of the details he had been describing for years, including the way Sobha Ram had died. While he doesn’t use the term walk-in soul, Dr. Stevenson lists 39 different pieces of evidence that support Jasbir’s claim that he was once Sobha Ram.

Jasbir recognized and named people he’d never met in his current life. He even knew nicknames! Once taken to the village where the Tyagis lived, he could lead the way to his previous home among other places he’d never been to in this lifetime.

Two Different Families

Jasbir knew so many specific things about the Tyagis that they fully accepted him as a member of their family. Jasbir was particularly fond of Baleshwar, the son of Sobha Ram. If someone gave Jasbir a gift, he merely passed it on to Baleshwar instead of playing with it himself. As he got older, he remained in contact with — and even pined for — the Tyagi family. They consulted him for situations such as arranged marriages for Sobha Ram’s children.

Things were more difficult from the perspective of Jasbir’s current family. While Sobha Ram’s family celebrated being reunited in such an unexpected way, Jasbir’s family often felt inferior, disrespected, and afraid of having Jasbir taken away from them. Jasbir showed affection for the Tyagis but remained aloof and depressed when he was with his other family. As the years passed, thankfully all of these things leveled out. Dr. Stevenson credits Jasbir’s parents for finding a way to handle such a difficult situation.