Relatives of the 45 victims of Wednesday’s bus tragedy had a harrowing time, a day after the shocking incident. Most of them sat outside the Osmania General Hospital mortuary under a tent carrying photographs and every possible article they could get hold of to identify the bodies.
But with the authorities clarifying that it would take some time to complete DNA tests and conclusively establish identities of the victims, they were completely distraught.
Amidst this agonising wait, two families claimed the remains of one body. According to police, D21 (number given to the body) was claimed and taken away by a family on Wednesday. But another family came forward Thursday claiming the body by citing circumstantial evidence. Amarnath, father of 33-year-old techie I Siva Kiran, who died in the incident, rued, “We have identified his watch, belt and mobile phone. Even the memory card in the phone has our family photographs. We are not being given the body even after all this evidence.”
P Venkateswarulu, circle inspector, Kothakota, said the body was claimed and taken away by the family of Akshay Singh, another techie who died in the accident, on Wednesday itself. The body had to be brought back to the Osmania General Hospital morgue after Amaranth claimed it. Siva Kiran was from Bodhan in Nizamabad district.
His cousin I Sujatha, said, “First they (the other family) took away the body disowning the belongings and that’s how we recognised our body but now since there is a dispute, we have been asked to wait for the FSL report.”
The family of 22-year-old Akshay Singh, on the other hand, refuses to believe they have the wrong body.
“We were informed by one of Akshay’s colleagues that he was wearing blue jeans and black T-shirt. We found two such bodies. Since, both were completely burnt, we claimed one that was similar to Akshay,” explained Akash Singh, Akshay’s brother.
According to him, Akshay wore an OM locket and was carrying his laptop — both are missing from the entire lot of belongings available. Akshay, youngest among three sons in the family, was on his way to celebrate Diwali with his family in the city. He used to work for a software firm in Bengaluru.
Siva Kiran had been living at KPHB colony with his wife Naveena and three-year old son Taran Sai for a year. According to Amarnath, Siva Kiran had gone to Bengaluru for a two-day training and was on his way back home when tragedy struck. “He was a genius. Extremely smooth and very jovial so much so that despite being a software engineer, he would go and spend time with his favourite tea stall vendor and sleep over at his mechanic’s house whenever he visited Bengaluru,” said Siva Abhishek, his brother and a third-year BTech student. Siva Kiran worked in Bengaluru for about eight years and was a keen dancer too.
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