'Age-old Custom': Reappearance of Bodies Alongside Ganga in Prayagraj Contradicts Unaccounted Covid Death Claims | Exclusive

A year after earning a bad name for being an abode of bodies of Covid-19 victims, the Phaphamau ghat in the northern part of Prayagraj in Uttar Pradesh has once again come under the limelight. The reappearance of dead bodies on this ghat along the banks of the Ganga now not only contradicts last year’s unaccounted Covid-19 death claims but also reveals a reason behind this phenomenon.

Ground reports by News18 India reveal that the Phaphamau ghat along the banks of Ganga is being used as a burial ground for years by the people of Prayagraj and nearby districts in UP even before Covid-19 struck India. The site has been in use for burying the deceased as part of a custom and the graves are visible during this time of the year every year owing to the low levels of water, as per the report.

“The practice of burying the dead bodies along the Ganga has been going on for ages and is a very old custom. It especially caters to the poor people who do not have enough funds to perform the rites and instead buries the bodies alongside Ganga which is considered to be holy,” a local resident told News18 when asked about the buried dead bodies in the ghat.

Speaking on the same, BJP spokesperson Rakesh Tripathi said, “During the second wave of Covid-19, rumors were spread to malign the UP govt under the rule of Yogi Adityanath and also the Centre. We kept asserting that this act of burying the bodies on the banks of Ganga is an age-old custom but this was misreported by the western media. We are glad that the truth has been exposed.”

Even though the resurfacing of graves contradicts the past claims, Samajwadi Party leader Faqrul Hassan still maintained that the government has a role to play in “hiding the real numbers of Covid-19 deaths” during the second wave.

“How is it possible that the figures are shown by the WHO and that by the BJP and UP government pertaining to Covid casualties differ so much? No matter how much the BJP tries to cover the facts, the citizens of India know, how many loved ones they have lost,” he said.

In May 2021, when the second wave of Covid-19 was at its peak, photos of dead bodies buried in the sand along the banks of Ganga in the city of Prayagraj took social media by storm. Viral photos of these bodies wrapped in clothes and demarcated using bamboo sticks gave way to myriads of allegations.

Several media reports, including foreign news outlets, had alleged underreporting of coronavirus casualties by the BJP-led government in UP. It was reported that bodies were dumped along the river Ganga at the time of the second wave of coronavirus as the crematoria and graveyards were overwhelmed with corpses thus resulting in a number of unaccounted deaths.

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