Ahead of Easter triduum, S Goa morgue full, hosp tells cops to clear bodies today

Panaji: The South Goa district hospital has said that its mortuary has been filled to capacity for the past six weeks, and asked police to urgently dispose of bodies. The situation has worsened as the Margao municipal council has not cremated a single unclaimed body for a month. The hospital administration has now told cops that if steps are not taken in the next 24 hours, the public will be inconvenienced as Christians don’t conduct funerals from Maundy Thursday till Easter Sunday.

In its letter to the South Goa SP and Konkan Railways SP with a copy to the South Goa collector, the hospital stated that during Holy Week, it usually reserves at least 15 cabinets. “Unfortunately, this time our mortuary is ‘house full’ for the past six weeks as Margao Municipality has stopped arranging for the cremation of unclaimed dead bodies for want of funds,” stated the hospital in the letter written by Dr Madhu Ghodkirekar, its head of forensic medicine. The morgue has 18 unclaimed bodies that the MMC is supposed to dispose of. Twelve cabinets are not in use and require maintenance.

The hospital’s medical superintendent, Dr Rajendra Borkar, said that the morgue has a requirement of 15 cabinets on a daily basis.

He said the hospital has already conducted post-mortem examinations on the bodies, but that these have been left at the morgue for the past month and a half. “We have already requested the Margao municipality to conduct the final rites of these bodies and vacate our cabinets, but they haven’t done so,” he said.

Ghodkirekar told TOI that the crunch will be felt from Wednesday onwards, for when any members of the Catholic community pass away, their funerals won’t be carried out from Maundy Thursday till Easter Sunday. “Elected representatives are coming forward and are ready to bear the cost, but this is not a permanent solution. The municipality should have its own budget and workers for disposal of cadavers,” he said. “Govt is ready to pay Rs 4.5 lakh for the treatment of a person with cancer, but nobody is ready to pay Rs 3,600 to carry out final rites. There should be dignity in death too,” he said.

Margao municipality chief officer Madhu Narvekar stated that the municipality wrote to the additional collector, with reminders, to release the payment to the municipality. An official from the collectorate said the health department has not created a budget head at their level for the disposal of bodies by the municipality. The official said the municipality will begin disposing of the bodies from Wednesday.


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