New Delhi: It was a miscommunicated missive from the Ministry of Home Affairs sent internally to immigration authorities – saying new standard operating procedures for handling dead bodies of COVID-19 patients were in the pipeline – that led to a chain reaction and resulted in three dead bodies of Indians being returned from Delhi airport last week.
On Thursday evening, the mortal remains of Kamlesh Bhatt, Sanjeev Kumar and Jagsir Singh were flown in a cargo flight operated by Etihad Airlines. All three had died of non-COVID-19 causes earlier this month.
But, on arriving in Delhi airport, the immigration authorities refused to permit the off-loading of the bodies. By 7 am on Friday, the airline had left India with the bodies, even as the family members who had come to the airport to collect their remains waited in vain.
The Indian ambassador to the UAE, Pawan Kapoor, told Gulf News that he was “appalled at what has happened”.
He told the Dubai-based newspaper that it was not clear whether the “bodies were returned because of coronavirus related restrictions”, but added that it was obvious that no bodies of infected Indians were being sent to India.
Kapoor stated that the fiasco probably happened due to “new protocols at the airport and we are trying to sort it out”.
On the same day, Kamlesh Bhatt’s brother, Vimlesh Bhatt, approached the Delhi high court, which conducted an urgent hearing through video conference. The next date was fixed for Monday, as the Centre claimed that they needed for time to get details, as per a PTI report.
“In a most inhumane, insensitive and unexpected conduct of the respondents the human remains of the deceased were sent back to UAE on the same flight without citing any order/notification/circular or furnishing any medical report by a medical officer or giving any explanation or reason to the petitioner who kept praying for handing over of the mortal remains of his 24-year-old younger brother,” the plea submitted by Bhatt, through his lawyers, said.
As per PTI, Additional Solicitor General Maninder Acharya told the Delhi high court that it was a “unique case”, and the ministries of home affairs and health and family welfare were in the process of framing Standard Operating Procedures so that in future, there is no difficulty in similar matters.
It is not clear as to why this case is “unique”, as transportation of mortal remains of Indian nationals from Gulf countries is a long-established practice with guidelines in place.
Even after all international air transport links were snapped and India went into lockdown last month, several bodies have been transported to the Gulf on cargo flights, which continue to be operated.
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Ashraf Thamarassery has been working as a volunteer to repatriate thousands of bodies of Indians from the UAE the last 14 years, for which he received a Pravasi Bharatiya Samman in 2015.
He had also helped to facilitate the transportation of the mortal remains of the three Indians. “It is the first time that it has ever happened,” Ashraf told The Wire on the phone about the bodies being rejected and brought back to Dubai.
He is especially shocked with the turn of events as he had managed to get other mortal remains successfully transported even during this lockdown period. “Last week, seven bodies were repatriated to Delhi airport. Earlier, over 25 were sent to Chennai and Kerala,” he said.
Thamarassery claimed that he heard that the mother of one of the men had to be treated in hospital after she learnt that the body was sent back to Dubai. “It does not matter who it is. Everyone needs dignity in death.”
It is learnt that the debacle at the Delhi airport may have started due to an exercise by the home ministry to prepare standard operating procedures for repatriation of bodies of COVID-19-positive patients once the lockdown ends. As per a Times of India report, at least 40 Indians have died abroad after getting infected with COVID-19.
However, before the SOPs were ready, the bureaucracy at lower levels in the ministry and especially at the immigration points got the notion that there there was going to be an overhaul in the entire process for the repatriation of all bodies.
Till now, the repatriation of a body required a no-objection certificate from the Indian embassy, which also cancelled the passport of the deceased individual at the same time. However, there was a bit of a surprise when MHA suggested that even the MEA headquarters should give a separate no-objection certificate.
There was a bit of heartburn in South Block that MHA was, perhaps, trying to mess up the process which has worked relatively smoothly for years.
While creating a new SOP for handling bodies of COVID-19 patients was understandable, it was not clarified why a revision was required for repatriation of mortal remains of Indians who had not died of coronavirus – which had been the norm, so far.
When the bodies arrived in India, airlines official were informed that there had been a change in procedure and a no-objection certificate was required from both ministries. While MEA issued a clearance quickly, officials at the home ministry baulked in the absence of any clear steps.
As the hours ticked by with no green light from the home ministry, Etihad returned with the mortal remains back to the Gulf kingdom.
Incidentally, the Ministry of Home Affairs issued guidelines on the handling of bodies of Indian nationals who died of coronavirus abroad on their arrival at Indian airports a day later. It had not included the provision of an additional no-objection certificate from a ministry in Delhi.
Meanwhile, government sources indicated that after the unprecedented incident on Friday, there had been some ticking-off which had led to MHA to quickly take a back step. “After a week of confusion, the guidelines were clarified. We should be getting more bodies transported back to India this week,” they said.
Three days after they first made the trip, the three Indians made their second and final journey in the early hours of Monday (April 27). “All three human remains that were sent back Friday reached early this morning and handed over to respective relatives in Delhi,” said a senior government official.