mangalore today

Indian with 39 wives, 94 kids is Ripley’s top story for 2011


Mtoday news / CNN-IBN

Washington, Dec 16: An Indian man with 39 wives, 94 children and 33 grandchildren, all living under one roof, holds the numero uno position in Ripley’s Believe It or Not top 11 strangest stories for this year.

 

Ripley’s

 

Ripley’s Believe It or Not!, is considered to be the authority on all things odd, amazing and unusual. The annual list of the strangest stories of the year was released by it on Thursday.

Topping the list if 11 strange stories, is the story reported by London based The Telegraph, about Ziona Chana, who lives in a four storied building with 100 rooms in a mountainous village in Mizoram, sharing borders with Burma and Bangladesh.

 

Indian with 39 wives

 

"It’s a safe bet that Ziona Chana would not be impressed watching ’19 Kids and Counting’ or ’Sister Wives’. The 66-year-old Indian man has 39 wives, 94 children and 33 grandchildren," said Ripley’s Believe It or Not in a statement.

"I once married 10 women in one year," Chana is quoted as saying by The Telegraph. According to the daily, Chana met his oldest wife, who is three years older than he is, when he was 17.

 

28 of 39 wives

 

children of 39 wives

 

Other strangest stories include ’implanting organs in the name of art’; ’Liechtenstein for Hire at $ 70,000 a Night’; ’Blind Dog Gets Own Guide Dog’; ’Cemetery Collector with 29 Bodies Arrested’; ’Alabama Company Turns Gun Lovers’ Ashes into Ammunition’ and ’Mexican Vampire Woman Maria Jose Cristerna Immortalized in Wax by Ripley’s’ among others.