Before he could properly form full sentences, he was asking his family to look after a wife and children he'd never met — in a city he'd never been to.
Titu Singh was born in December 1983 in a village called Baad, near Agra, India. From around age two, he began insisting his real name was Suresh Verma, that he owned a radio and television shop in Agra, and that he had a wife named Uma and two children waiting for him there. His case became one of the most closely examined in the academic literature on children who claim to remember previous lives.
Persistent Claims
Titu's insistence didn't fade with time. He told his family he'd been shot in the head one night while arriving home in his car, describing the moment in specific detail, and named a man he said was responsible: a businessman he called Johaadien. He grew increasingly distressed at not being taken to Agra, at one point packing his belongings and threatening to leave home on his own.
A Radio Shop, Confirmed
Eventually, Titu's older brother traveled to Agra to check the claims. He found a shop matching the description — Suresh Radio — and learned from its owner's widow, Uma Verma, that her husband had indeed been shot and killed outside their home in August 1983, in an unsolved shooting. When told that a young boy claimed to be her deceased husband, Uma traveled to meet Titu's family.
Recognitions
According to case documentation, Titu recognized Uma and other family members on sight, recalled a private family memory involving a bag of sweets that only Uma and Suresh had known about, and later, during a visit to Agra, correctly identified changes made to the shop since Suresh's death, picked out the correct cash drawer, and recognized Suresh's children among a group of unfamiliar playing children — details his family had specifically arranged as tests.
Matching Birthmarks
Researchers who examined Titu found a small, indented birthmark on his right temple and another on the back of his head. When compared against Suresh Verma's autopsy report, the locations matched the bullet's entry and exit wounds. This case became one of several examined in the broader academic literature on birthmarks reportedly corresponding to fatal injuries in a claimed previous life.
Researcher Involvement
The case drew attention from Dr. Ian Stevenson, a University of Virginia psychiatrist who spent decades documenting children's claimed past-life memories, and was formally investigated as part of a 1989 replication study by researcher Antonia Mills, working alongside Delhi University's Professor N.K. Chadha. Mills's case report documented fifteen statements Titu made before ever meeting Suresh's family, and thirty-one more afterward — with only one later found to be inaccurate — along with correct identifications of ten people and four locations.
The Disputed Ending
Many popular retellings of this case claim that Titu later named his alleged killer to Agra police, that the man was questioned and confessed, and that a court proceeding formally addressed the murder. It's worth being clear that this specific detail doesn't appear in the primary academic case report researchers actually cite (Mills, 1989); it circulates mainly through secondary magazine and blog accounts from the following years. Whether a formal police or court resolution actually occurred as described remains unconfirmed by the underlying scholarly documentation.
Life Since
As an adult, Titu reportedly pursued a peaceful path rather than one resembling Suresh's, earning a graduate degree in yoga and naturopathy and going on to teach in that field. Researchers have noted this contrast as one of many observations recorded across similar case studies.
Frequently Asked Questions
Was this case scientifically proven?
No. It's documented as one of the more thoroughly investigated claimed reincarnation cases in the academic literature, but reincarnation itself remains outside the bounds of what science can currently test or confirm.
Did the two families know each other before this happened?
According to the researchers who investigated the case, no prior contact between the families was found.
Was anyone ever charged with Suresh Verma's murder?
This is unclear. The claim that police questioned and obtained a confession from a suspect appears in popular accounts but not in the primary academic case documentation.
What happened to Titu Singh as an adult?
He reportedly pursued a career in yoga and naturopathy education, a notably different path from the life he described remembering.