3 Siliguri women performing last rites to Covid, non-Covid bodies

Three Siliguri women have been performing the last rites of people who died due to COVID-19.

Sonai Choudhury Dasgupta(32), Joyita Sengupta Dutta(29), and Disha Mitra (25), residents of Siliguri have been performing several such rites since the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. They are also cremating bodies of non-Covid patients as well.

The trio took up the task when they realised that the relatives of the deceased are shying away from cremating the bodies of their near and dear ones, who died of COVID-19, due to the fear of coronavirus, stigma, and financial crunch.

Joyita Sengupta Dutta said that they have burnt around 12 Covid and non-Covid bodies in the past one and half years.

She also added, "Sometimes we feel bad that the family members are distancing themselves with the body and are not ready to perform the last rites, but sometimes feel proud that we became the family members of the deceased."

"Sometimes the family members wanted to show the last rites through video call when they denied coming at the ghat. Our team is always ready to do cremation of these bodies. We feel proud and we will continue," said Sonai Choudhury Dasgupta.

The group performed the last rites of an elderly woman whose family members were less in number to conduct all the rituals on Thursday. However, this woman did not die due to COVID-19.

( With inputs from ANI )

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