In MP, number of funerals raise underreporting fears

BHOPAL: On Tuesday, 84 bodies were cremated or buried in Bhopal with Covid-19 protocols, according to the officials of two crematoriums and a graveyard of Bhopal, even though the health department reported only five Covid-19 deaths in the city, and 40 across Madhya Pradesh.

State health minister Prabhuram Chaudhary denied allegations that the state may be underreporting deaths. “We came to know about the cremation of bodies in large numbers and we are looking into the matter. But there is no under reporting of cases and deaths.”

Madhya Pradesh reported 6,477 cases and 32 deaths a day on average over the week ended Wednesday. The state has thus far recorded 363,352 cases of Covid-19 and seen 4,312 deaths.

On Tuesday, 47 bodies were cremated according to Covid-19 protocols at Bhadbhada Vishram Ghat, 28 bodies at Subhash Nagar, and nine bodies were buried at Jehangirabad graveyard.

Pradeep Kannojiya, 32, a staffer at the Subhash Nagar crematorium, said: “I am cremating Covid-19 infected bodies for the past a year but I have never seen such a pile up of bodies as I have seen in the past one week. People have to wait for hours for cremation. The relatives are waiting with ambulance outside the ground for cremation. This is endemic now.”

“The situation is getting so bad that crematoriums are facing a shortage of timber as about 400450 quintal wood is being consumed daily...,” said Mamtesh Sharma, an employee of Bhadbhada

Vishram Ghat.

Jehangirabad graveyard incharge Rehan Golden said, “We are digging the burial pit in advance as nine bodies reached the graveyard on Tuesday, which is highest number of bodies buried in a day in recent years.”

It wasn’t immediately clear whether the bodies were tested for Covid-19, in keeping with an Indian Council of Medical Research guideline issued last year during the first wave of the pandemic.

Madhya Pradesh is among the 12 states and Union territories in the country where the second wave of the outbreak has surpassed the peak witnessed during the first wave. The current sevenday average of daily cases in the state (6,477, and rising fast) is 2.6 times that of the peak seen in the first wave (2,523 new cases every day for the week ending September 22, 2020). In other words, the state is reporting 2.6 times as many cases every day as it did during the worst of the first wave.

Experts said deaths from Covid have increased as people are reacting late to the symptoms and by the time they reach hospitals it is too late. They said that an overburdened health infrastructure has created panic.

Rachna Dhingra, the convener of an organisation working for the victims of the Bhopal Gas tragedy, Bhopal Group of Information and Action, said: “On Monday and Tuesday, a (Bhopal) gas tragedy victim had to wait 48 hours to get an ICU bed and his condition deteriorated due to delay in getting treatment...but patients are not getting ICU beds and oxygen supply equipped beds.