Guna, A 31-year-old woman’s family was forced to perform her post-death rituals in the open outside the district hospital mortuary in Madhya Pradesh’s Guna on Saturday before her funeral at a crematorium, as their landlord refused to allow her body into their rented house citing Navratri festival.
Pooja’s father, Pehalwan Rajak, faced the painful ordeal of arranging her last rites despite a severe financial crunch and the lack of a permanent home. The family had been residing in a rented accommodation in the Ghosipura area of Guna for the last four years. Keeping that in mind, the grieving family decided not to object to the landlord’s request. As the family struggled to arrange the final farewell, social worker Pramod Bhargava and cow-protection volunteer Ram Singh Rajak stepped in to offer assistance. With their support, the family completed the customary rituals for a married woman in the open courtyard near the hospital mortuary before shifting the body to the cremation ground.
Pehalwan said as they planned to take Pooja’s body home, the landlord asked them against doing so, citing the ongoing religious rituals of Navratri.
