The court was hearing a PIL it initiated, taking cognizance of a news report which said that at the Covid-19 mortuary of Lok Nayak Hospital, there are 108 bodies, and 28 bodies on the floor piled on top of each other.

The Delhi High Court sought to know from the Delhi government and the three MCDs the reasons for slow disposal of bodies of those who died of Covid-19 in a hospital.

A bench of Chief Justice D N Patel and Justice Prateek Jalan, during the hearing Tuesday, directed the Delhi government and MCDs to file “further status report/affidavit, also stating whether the guidelines/ directions issued by the Government of NCT of Delhi on May 30, 2020… is scrupulously being followed”. It listed the matter for June 15.

The direction was issued after the bench, while going through the Delhi government’s Health department’s status report, found that as of May 31, 2020, “of a total of 45 bodies, only 7 were disposed of and 10 new dead bodies were received”.

“We would like to know from the respondents the reasons for slow disposal of these dead bodies… It is one thing to issue directions/guidelines and it is absolutely a different thing to ensure the execution of those directions.

“We are not burdening the respondents by adding any further directions to the directions already issued by the respondent no.1 (Delhi government) on May 30, 2020. However, what we expect from the respondents is proper execution of those guidelines/directions so that the aforesaid dead bodies may be disposed of at the earliest…,” said the bench.

The court was hearing a PIL it initiated, taking cognizance of a news report which said that at the Covid-19 mortuary of Lok Nayak Hospital, there are 108 bodies, and 28 bodies on the floor piled on top of each other.