Unable To Bring Back UP Man's Body, Family Performs Symbolic Funeral

Unable To Bring Back UP Man's Body, Family Performs Symbolic Funeral
Gorakpur, Uttar Pradesh :

A Rs 1.75 lakh-crore scheme was announced last month by the central government to help the economically weaker sections survive the loss of jobs and income, an inevitable fallout of the coronavirus pandemic. Despite the bailout package, heartbreaking stories continue to emerge from across the country about the struggle of poor people amid a nationwide shutdown to check the spread of the highly contagious illness.

A distressing incident has now emerged from a village in eastern Uttar Pradesh's Gorakhpur district, about 260 km from state capital Lucknow. A family of a 37-year-old daily wage labourer who died due to chicken pox in Delhi, had to perform his last rites a few day ago using a symbolic straw dummy in their village. His body is in Delhi and his poverty-stricken family has no means to bring it back.

Sunil, the 37-year-old man, had gone to Delhi in January to work as a labourer. He found a house on rent and started working at a tyre repair shop.

About 10 days ago, on 11 April, he fell ill and his landlord took him to the Bara Hindu Rao hospital in the national capital. He was then referred to three hospitals because doctors suspected he had coronavirus. The man was finally admitted at the state-run Safdarjung Hospital.

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Sunil died in Delhi on April 14.

He died at the hospital on April 14; his COVID-19 test reports came out to be negative.

Sunil's family in Gorakhpur says that his landlord informed them about his illness when he was taken to the hospital. But when they tried to get in touch with him on mobile phone, they received no response.

On April 14, a policeman picked up his phone and told the family he had died.

The cop also asked them if they could make arrangements to come to the national capital, and take the body back to their village in UP.

Sunil's wife, Poonam, who has to now take care of their five children alone, said that she tried talking to the village head to make arrangement for the travel but all the attempts turned futile. Her youngest child is just one-year-old.

After exhausting all options, she asked the village head to request the Delhi Police to perform the last rites.

"I told them about my inability to travel. Trains are not running... we have no money to hire a car. I have young children, no land and no one to make ends meet," a distraught Poonam recalled.

According to the Delhi police, they have not yet performed the last rites as they are awaiting a written consent from the family through the state government.

In Gorakhpur, the village pradhan - Chandra Shekhar - told NDTV that the wife has signed on a consent form and this would be relayed to the Delhi Police soon.  

The family lives in a hut, has no ration card. The state government has now promised help. "A senior government official visited the family . He told me to facilitate the process of getting a ration card, widow pension for Poonam, and a pucca house for these people at the earliest," Chandra Shekhar said.

World

Coronavirus has spread to 185 countries. The total confirmed cases worldwide are 24,76,854 and 1,70,299 have died; 16,59,795 are active cases and 6,46,760 have recovered as on April 21, 2020 at 8:30 am.

India

In India, there are 18,601 confirmed cases including 590 deaths. The number of active cases is 14,759 and 3,252 have recovered as on April 21, 2020 at 8:00 am.

State & District Details

State Cases Active Recovered Deaths Maharashtra

4666

3862

572

232

Delhi

2081

1603

431

47

Gujarat

1939

1737

131

71

Rajasthan

1576

1346

205

25

Tamil Nadu

1520

1046

457

17

Madhya Pradesh

1485

1284

127

74

Uttar Pradesh

1184

1026

140

18

Telangana

873

660

190

23

Andhra Pradesh

722

610

92

20

Kerala

408

114

291

3

Karnataka

408

280

112

16

West Bengal

392

307

73

12

Jammu And Kashmir

368

292

71

5

Haryana

254

124

127

3

Punjab

245

191

38

16

Bihar

113

69

42

2

Odisha

74

49

24

1

Uttarakhand

46

28

18

0

Jharkhand

46

44

0

2

Himachal Pradesh

39

22

16

1

Chhattisgarh

36

11

25

0

Assam

35

15

19

1

Chandigarh

26

13

13

0

Ladakh

18

4

14

0

Andaman And Nicobar Islands

16

5

11

0

Meghalaya

11

10

0

1

Goa

7

0

7

0

Puducherry

7

4

3

0

Manipur

2

0

2

0

Tripura

2

1

1

0

Mizoram

1

1

0

0

Arunachal Pradesh

1

1

0

0

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