Last Hurrah: Who says life hurts a lot more than death? 

The news of her death did not come as a surprise. She was ailing and bed-ridden. She was over 90 years old and lived with her daughter and son-in-law. Several times a day she would soil the bed and needed to be cleaned, attended to and fresh sets of clothes and bed sheets replaced the soiled set. The end was expected for a long time and death seemed like a blessing.

I was getting ready to go out and pay my condolences to the family when my sons put their feet down. I couldn’t possibly go out and put myself and the rest of the family members to the risk of catching the infection. My argument that she died of natural causes and not because of Coronavirus cut no ice. How could I be so sure, they asked.

I later learnt that even neighbours did not turn up to pay their last respect or condole with the family. Her daughter and son-in-law called a hearse and were forced to hire some labourers to carry the dead body out of the house, transport it to the crematorium and complete the last rites.

In large metros this is routine. Unless the deceased was a long-term resident, well connected and well heeled, few neighbours, friends and even relatives can squeeze time out of their schedule and turn up to condole or help the bereaved family. In Ghaziabad and Delhi, commuting takes so long that ‘wasting’ four-five hours often doesn’t seem worth the trouble. In times of the Coronavirus, however, the deceased and the bereaved family are being treated like outcastes.

This was never the case in smaller towns, I recalled. A few years ago, when an elderly relative died in Bhagalpur, his children, who had assembled from different parts of the country, called for a hearse. But alerted by the sight of the hearse, neighbours gathered and complained. “What are neighbours for ? We will not allow the dead body to be carried in the hearse. We will lend our shoulders and carry the body,” they had insisted. The hearse had to be sent back. How times have changed, I reflected.

With a heavy heart, I called Bhagalpur, to reminisce and to be reassured. Guddu, my nephew, informed that a young man in the locality had died the day before. He was young but his kidneys failed. Relatives and neighbours assembed in good numbers but then in whispers people began to wonder if COVID-19 too had infected the young man. People with non-functioning kidneys, it was whispered, were more prone to the infection.

In no time, my nephew informed, the crowd melted away. The bereaved father called for a hearse from the municipal corporation. The driver was informed by some neighbours that the deceased had a kidney ailment and could have died of COVID19. In no time the driver took to his heels and drove away, refusing to carry the dead body. The body was finally cremated with great difficulty and only after a councillor came to the family’s rescue. Even Bhagalpur has changed.

Can people be blamed? Everyone fears for his life and is unwilling to take any risk.

But Manoj, a senior photographer in Bhagalpur, drew my attention to another aspect of human behaviour. “ The same day the young man died, I had been to the bazaar. It was crowded and people did not maintain any physical or social distancing. With the month of Shravan a few days away, during which people there would not eat non-vegetarian food, the butcher’s shop had been mobbed by a crowd. Nobody was even asking for the price...”

Nobody wants to get tested. But if even a family member tests positive, they would like the infected person to stay as far as possible. Faizan Ahmed, a senior journalist in Patna recently posted on Facebook that ever since his locality has come under the containment zone, friends and acquaintances have stopped making calls.

The virus does not spread over the phone, friends, he quipped