NEW DELHI: The Supreme Court on Tuesday directed the Manipur government to ensure decent and dignified burial of the unidentified and unclaimed bodies lying in mortuaries in the northeastern state, where ethnic clashes had claimed several lives.
A bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud noted that it would not be appropriate to keep the bodies indefinitely in the mortuaries while going through its mentioning in a report filed by the apex court-appointed all-woman committee of former high court judges, headed by justice (retd) Gita Mittal.
The bench, also comprising justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra also said DNA samples should be drawn before the burial as the criminal investigation in the violence case is ongoing. It noted that the report indicated that 169 of the 175 bodies have been identified while six have not been identified.
Noting that out of the 169 identified bodies, 81 have been claimed by the next of kin while 88 have not been claimed, it was directed by the bench that the list of identified bodies should be duly intimated to the next of kin and the last rites should be performed with dignity and observance of religious rites of the community.
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The bench said this exercise must be carried out on or before December 4.
The apex court is seized of a batch of pleas, including those seeking court-monitored probes into cases of violence, besides measures for relief and rehabilitation.
The state is permitted to issue a public notice indicating that if bodies, that are identified, are not claimed within a period of one week from the date of issuance of the notice, the state shall carry out the last rites… after the expiry of the period of one week by complying with the directions which have been issued above," it said.
The bench said it would hear on December 4 the issues raised in the committee's report about acceptance of ex-gratia to kin of the victims.