No land for the dead

By Our Correspondent
Hyderabad, Feb. 8: Even the dead don’t get a final resting place easily these days thanks to the real estate boom and the scramble for land in recent years.There is no space available in burial grounds and the rates of funeral rites for a single body have also gone up to around Rs 10,000 for all the communities.This has put the poor in the most distressing situation. They are not even able to give a decent burial to their family members. Nearly 90 per cent of the space in most of the Muslim graveyards and Christian cemeteries has been exhausted. And there is no other land available.“Earlier, people used to endow (wakf) large extents of land for graveyards but now no individual, family or even institution is coming forward to donate land,” said Moulana Syed Akbar Nizamuddin, an eminent Muslim scholar. “This is because of the high price of land.”So the old graves are being reopened to accommodate the new dead persons from the same family. In Hindu Smashana Vatikas like the one at Punjagutta, the management committees have stopped allotting space for construction of samadhis (permanent gravestones) because of the same reason. They are only allowing cremation. Each family has to spend a minimum of Rs 2,500 as cremation charges. Expenses go up if the family prefers a better quality wood and ghee instead of kerosene. When transportation charges are also taken into account, the amount touches Rs 10,000.“We can’t allow samadhis to come up here since there is no space,” said Mr Anil Kumar, president of the Punjagutta Hindu Smashana Vatika Association. “We have to reopen old graves,” said Mr John Kennedy, secretary of the newly formed Catholics Cemetery Development Committee. “Adding to the woes is the encroachment in cemeteries.” He added that when a grave at Mettuguda cemetery was opened to bury a nun, it was found to be oozing water. “This is because slum dwellers and washerwomen wash their clothes on the upper side of the cemetery and that water flows into the graves,” he said. “It is for the civic bodies to do something about this.”Some families were distressed to find the gravestones of their dear ones missing. To prevent this, the cemetery development committee has started numbering the graves and issuing identity cards to the families.“There are already over 3,500 graves in the Bhoiguda cemetery,” said Mr Kennedy. “On an average 15 to 20 burials are held every month. So we are identifying and reopening unknown graves.”Christians too have to spend a tidy sum to get a decent burial. Coffins cost anything from Rs 1,000 to Rs 25,000. Then, they have to rent a hearse van, pay digging charges and meet other expenses. “Of course, the Church provides discount to the poor,” said Mr Kennedy.Mufti Khaleel Ahmed said that as per the Shariah, graves which are more than 30 years old can be reopened and used for the burial again. “An awareness campaign has to be launched among the Muslim community,” he said. The Mufti also expressed sadness at graveyards charging Rs 2,000 for maintenance. The 200-year-old Narayanguda Protestant Cemetery is also facing a severe space crunch. It has to conduct 25 to 30 burials a month. “The place is fully occupied, and now every burial will have to be above an existing grave,” said one of the office bearers of the cemetery. “We can no longer give vaults and tombstones to families.”And when people arrive to pray for the dead during All Souls Day, they are distressed as graves of their loved ones are missing. Those who maintain the cemeteries can just shrug their shoulders.