Over 50 women in the northern Indian states of Haryana and Rajasthan have reported that mysterious persons have been chopping off their hair while they were unconscious. The police are struggling to solve the mystery, leaving women paranoid and worried, reports BBC.

53-year-old housewife from Guargaon district in Haryana said, ‘There was a strong flash of light that left me unconscious. An hour later, I found that my hair had also been chopped off.’

 The ‘attack’ on Friday has left her traumatised.

‘I am unable to sleep or concentrate on anything. I had read about such incidents taking place in Rajasthan, but never thought it would happen to me,’ she adds.

Reports of ‘phantom barbers’ first emerged in early July from Rajasthan, but a spate of similar incidents are being reported from Haryana and even the capital, Delhi.

Ms Devi lives in a close-knit community of traders and farmers.

Some of her neighbours are taking it in turns to stay with her until she is able to come out of the shock.

She says her attacker was an elderly man ‘dressed in bright-coloured clothes’.

‘I was alone on the ground floor of the house, and my daughter-in-law and grandson were upstairs when the attack happened at around 9:30pm,’ she says. However, they saw and heard nothing.

Soon after this incident the police got another call from Devi Lal Nagar, where a 20-year-old had fallen prey to the invisible barber, reports Times of India.

According to victim, Sapna, she was asleep beside her children, when saw a cat enter her room in the early hours of Monday. Sapna claimed that cat soon transformed into a woman, who pounced on her.