Young son's body flown in-out of India within hours; leaving distraught parents clueless

Mortal remains of a 23-year-old youth were brought to India from Abu Dhabi and was sent back to the UAE, within hours. In this article, ETV Bharat Deputy Editor Krishnanand Tripathi outlined how a family was unable to perform the last rites in India due to lack of coordination between the two ministries.

New Delhi: In a clear case of lack of empathy on the parts of Indian authorities, grieving parents and relatives of a young Indian, who died in Abu Dhabi last week, have been deprived of receiving his mortal remains and performing his last rites in India as per their tradition and custom.

What is even more painful is the fact that the mortal remains of 23 years old Kamlesh Bhatt, a native of Tehri Garhwal, who died due to cardiac arrest in Abu Dhabi last week, were flown to India this week but have been sent back to UAE within hours, leaving his parents and relative clueless.

According to the deceased Kamlesh Bhatt’s relatives, the mortal remains of three Indian passport holders were brought back to India in Etihad flight EY 9809 on April 23 and all three bodies were flown back to Abu Dhabi after the bureau of immigration authorities refused the permission to receive them here.

According to the deceased - Kamlesh Bhatt’s relatives, when they were about to reach the airport to receive the body, they were informed by the concerned staff that the mortal remains will not be unloaded here in India due to a new circular issued by the Ministry of Home Affairs.

“When we asked them (the staff at the cargo terminal), they told me that due to a new circular issued by the MHA that day, the body could not be received here in India. They also refused to share a copy of circular and just gave me a number of MHA which was not working,” said Manish Uniyal, the maternal uncle of the deceased Kamlesh Bhatt.

“This is a clear case of lack of coordination between the two ministries, if Indian Embassy had given the permission to fly the mortal remains to India then no branch of Government of India should disallow this thing,” said Vimlesh Bhatt, a cousin of the deceased Kamlesh Bhatt, who came to Delhi from Dehradun, to receive his body by arranging a special pass.

“You can think about the situation of his parents. Their young son died in UAE, his mortal remains were flown to India and then they were flown back to UAE within hours due to some circular of the ministry of home affairs,” said Vimlesh Bhatt.

Vimlesh Bhatt said he was not in a position to convey the tragic news to the deceased’s parents who were waiting for their son’s body so that they could perform his last rites.

“You can think about our situation, we were supposed to receive his (Kamlesh Bhatt) mortal remains and take them to his parents. But they were flown back to Dubai despite our best efforts,” a grieving Vimlesh Bhatt told ETV Bharat.

“We were not in a position to convey this development to his parents. Who are struggling to figure out what is happening over the last week,” he said.

Relatives of Kamlesh Bhatt also complain that there was no communication from the Indian embassy in the UAE about the death of Kamlesh Bhatt.

“We received a call from the HR department of his employer in Abu Dhabi about Kamlesh’s death on April 17. But we did not receive any information from our embassy there,” Manish Uniyal said.

“We contacted some social worker over there for arranging the post-mortem and getting an NoC from the Indian embassy to bring back his mortal remains to India. We did all these things on our own with the help of a social worker Roshan Raturi,” said Vimlesh Bhatt, a cousin of the deceased.

ETV Bharat reached out to both the ministry of home affairs and also to the ministry of external affairs to find out the reasons for not handing over mortal remains of the deceased person to his relatives.

“We are trying to ascertain with our embassy about the protocol and procedures to be followed in such cases,” said a source in the ministry of external affairs in response to a question about lack of any communication by the Indian embassy in Abu Dhabi to the deceased Kamlesh Bhatt’s grieving parents.

The source also said that the issue pertained to the ministry of home affairs as the bureau of immigration handles such issues.

“You may get in touch with the Bureau of Immigration,” the source told ETV Bharat.

Sources in the ministry of home affairs said the information about the problems faced by Kamlesh Bhatt’s relatives in receiving his mortal remains in India have already been shared with the top officials of the ministry.

“The issue has been brought to the knowledge of all the authorities,” said a source in the ministry of home affairs while declining to comment beyond this.