At a time when the health and administrative machinery of the city is grappling with the outbreak of COVID-19, a video of civic workers handling bodies outside a morgue in the city has created a major controversy in political and administrative circles here. In the alleged video, decomposed bodies are seen being dragged into a Kolkata Municipal Corporation van in broad daylight.
The video was allegedly shot outside the Garia Crematorium under the Bansdroni police station where locals objected to the cremation. Some locals claimed that the bodies could be of COVID-19 patients who had died.
The principal of the State-run NRS Medical College wrote to the Kolkata Police Commissioner on Thursday that none of the bodies were of COVID-19 patients. “The fact is that 14 unclaimed bodies were being handed over to the KMC authority as per the list given by different police stations of our morgue’s jurisdiction,” the letter by the hospital authority read. The letter calls the “subject of the video” to be “fake” and urged the police to take necessary action.
West Bengal Governor Jagdeep Dhankhar expressed anguish over “disposal of dead bodies with heartless indescribable insensitivity” and said he had sought a report from the Home Secretary on this matter. Mr. Dhankhar said “rather than booking those responsible for such inhuman criminality, police are being misused to ‘teach a lesson’ to those who exposed it”.
Sujan Chakraborty, leader of the Left legislature party, wrote to the KMC administrator seeking identity of the deceased. State BJP president Dilip Ghosh alleged that the bodies were of those who died of COVID-19 and the State government was hiding figures of the deceased.
New cases, 10 deaths
The State recorded 440 new virus cases in the past 24 hours taking the total number of cases to 9,768. Ten more deaths due to the viral infection were reported from the State in the past 24 hours, four from Kolkata, two each from Howrah, North and South 24 Parganas districts. The total number of deaths in the State has increased to 442 and the active cases stands at 5,338