Indians are forced to change rituals for the dead as COVID-19 rages
Families want their loved ones cared for quickly, but there is a shortage of people who can do the funerals.
May 4, 2021
Mass cremations in the city of Bengaluru, India, due to the large number of COVID-19 deaths, April 30, 2021. (Photo by Abhishek Chinnappa/Getty Images)
Generally, tradition holds that the body is to be cremated or buried as quickly as possible – within 24 hours for Hindus, Jains and Muslims, and within three days for Sikhs. This need for rapid disposal has also contributed to the current crisis.
Hundreds of families want their loved ones’ bodies cared for as quickly as possible, but there is a shortage of people who can do the funerals and last rites. This has led to a situation where people are paying bribes in order to get space or a furnace for cremation. There are also reports of physical fights, and intimidation.
Indians are forced to change rituals for their dead as COVID-19 rages through cities and villages
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Indians are forced to change rituals for their dead as COVID-19 rages through cities and villages
theconversation.com - get the latest breaking news, showbiz & celebrity photos, sport news & rumours, viral videos and top stories from theconversation.com Daily Mail and Mail on Sunday newspapers.
If biological sex is a myth, so is evolution
In Material Girls, philosopher Kathleen Stock braves accusations of hate to publish a fearless, rigorous study of gender identity
30 April 2021 • 3:00pm
Under the skin: Toni Cantó as transgender woman Lola in Pedro Almodóvar s 1999 film All About My Mother
Credit: AF archive/Alamy
Nakedness has always, literally or metaphorically, epitomised stark, outrageous truth. Diogenes in the Athenian marketplace, King Lear on the stormy heath, 20th-century hippies: all were tearing off their clothes to reveal the “poor, bare, forked animal” that underlies pretension and pretence. But now nudity is not enough. We discern something yet more fundamental beneath the skin – gender identity.
No need – they are all here with us. The past is contained within the present.
Which historian has had the greatest influence on you?
My adviser, Thomas Laqueur.
Mirza Ghalib.
English; Hindustani and Punjabi; decent French; marginal German; forgotten Tamil; lost Latin.
What historical topic have you changed your mind on?
The Silk Letter Plot.
Which genre of history do you like least?
Economic history that ignores context. South Asian intellectual history that relies only on English-language sources. Triumphalist narratives of ‘the West’.
What’s the most exciting field in history today?
It’s all exciting: medieval, environmental, anti-colonialism, Indian Ocean.