In the duty of paying mortuary honours to...

Often looked down as a difficult job (post-mortem attendant), one where a person is exposed to the fumes emanating from embalmed bodies, 43-year-old Rajender Kumar has no qualms about doing the work at the Subzi Mandi mortuary.

On being asked about the consequences of the job, Kumar told The Pioneer that the job had a debilitating impact on his health with his eyesight weakening.

“I end up spending money on medicines as well. I have been working here for the past six years. Before me, my father used to work at the mortuary. There is no shame in this job. At a time when it is difficult to find a job, helping in post-mortem is not a bad job. People often ask me how disgusted I feel conducting the post-mortem on bodies.  On any given day, I along with a doctor, a nursing orderly and a technician conduct post-mortem on six to seven bodies.

“People who have lost their loved ones undergo emotional turmoil. As an attendant, the least I can do is do my job as an attendant earnestly,” said Kumar, who resides in Welcome area and looks after his wife and three children.

Before joining as an attendant here, he used to work at the Aruna Asif Ali hospital. “My duty hours are from 9 am to 4 pm every day except on weekends. I maintain the register which records the dead bodies the mortuary receives at night. Accordingly, doctors are called. Some 40 years back, adequate facilities were not made available to us. Apart from the customary hand gloves, mouth mask and apron, now we have four air purifiers and three cold chambers,” he said.

On being asked how they deal with the post-mortem on unidentified bodies at city’s largest mortuary, Kumar said, “We wait for 72 hours. In cases where there is no visible injury mark on the body, we go as per the Medico-Legal Case (MLC). If it is mentioned in the MLC that the person has tuberculosis or some other infection, we get a written permission from the Assistant Commissioner of Police (ACP)  and get the post-mortem waivered off.”

“The sole emotion behind sticking to this job is one: We are used to the job and only a sad person comes here so we work with a feeling of seva bhavna. We don’t harbour anger,” said Kumar.

At a monthly salary of Rs 40,000, Kumar is one of the four permanent attendants at the mortuary. Another attendant Harish travels all the way from Sonipat to the Rajpur Road-based mortuary near civil lines.

Harish, who just came out from the cold storage after completing a post-mortem told The Pioneer, “I get a monthly salary of Rs 10,000. I work on contractual basis.  I conduct post-mortem on five bodies every day. Apart from the salary, Rs 2,000 is credited to my account as Provident Fund. As long as I have a job, I am satisfied.” These attendants are mostly 10 or 12th pass.

In the absence of a job, they take it up, mostly carrying forward the job from their fathers.

Supervisor of attendants of the Subzi Mandi mortuary said, “Years ago, Subzi Mandi mortuary used to receive maximum bodies. However,  now we only receive bodies from police stations such as Kashmere Gate, Old Delhi Railway station and Kotwali. Maximum bodies belong to vagabonds. Outside the mortuary, the cops get the bodies lifted through a local by slipping in Rs 100 note but once the body reaches the mortuary, it is treated with respect. Our orderly along with attendant lifts the bodies. We have 16 trolleys to carry the bodies.”

The attendants work an eight-hour shift. 

“On any given time, we have two postmortem attendants and a security guard. The problems we faced earlier were dealing with decomposed bodies and those which belonged to unidentified people who died on the street,” he said.

Looking back in the 80s when the national Capital witnessed the 1984 Sikh riots, the supervisor said, “It was a horrible scene at the mortuary. Bodies were piled-up and stacked on the floor everywhere in the mortuary complex.”

“With the onset of winter, the number of bodies increases by manifold. In extreme weather conditions like peak summer and winter, we receive 50 bodies on an average daily.

“In comparison to other States, Subzi Mandi mortuary fares well in terms of the staff welfare and the arrangements for conducting the post-mortem,” added the supervisor, requesting anonymity.

A look at the pay scale of a mortuary attendant in Finland is perhaps shocking. They get 72 euro per hour which translates to Rs 1,800 per hour. On an average, they get paid 971 euro which means they get paid Rs 69,000 per month. Sixty per cent of them are high school pass.

Their duties include perform administrative and certain clinical duties under the direction of a physician. Administrative duties may include scheduling appointments, maintaining medical records, billing, and coding information for insurance purposes. Clinical duties may include taking and recording vital signs and medical histories, preparing patients for examination, drawing blood, and administering medications as directed by physician that excludes “physician assistants”.

In England, people look for the job on websites like  indeed and other social networking sites where the average salary is 20,000 euro. While in other countries, the demand is for some expertise in the field of medicine, back home in India, all they ask from a person is his willingness to work.