Dead bodies floating in Ganga: Bihar CM Nitish Kumar pained at tragedy, damage to holy river

IANS photo

PATNA: Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar was pained at the tragedy where dead bodies were found floating in Ganga in the Buxar city as well as the harm caused to the holy river, said State Water Resources Minister Sanjay Kumar Jha. 

Sanjay Kumar Jha, a key aide of the Bihar CM, told PTI, "He has always been particular about the purity and uninterrupted flow of the river and has asked the administration to intensify patrolling to ensure this is not repeated. Last rites of all the bodies have been performed as per protocols. A net has been placed in the Ganges in Ranighat, bordering UP and Bihar. We have advised the Uttar Pradesh administration to be vigilant. Our administration is keeping vigil, too. Advise all to give respect to the dead and also to Maa Ganga."

Posting a series of tweets, he asserting that the bodies had flown downstream from neighbouring Uttar Pradesh.

"The Bihar government is seized of the matter of unfortunate case of floating mortal remains in river Ganga... The bodies have floated into Bihar from UP," said Jha, adding, doctors have confirmed upon post-mortem that the deaths had taken place 4-5 days ago.

71 dead bodies fished out of river Ganga

At least 71 bodies, which were found floating in the river Ganga, were fished out, said officials, triggering suspicion that the abandoned corpses could be those of COVID-19 patients. 

A large number of bloated corpses were seen floating in the river bed in Chausa block of Buxar district on Monday (May 10), triggering shock waves. Though some news channels claimed these were of COVID-19 patients who might have been abandoned by resource-starved family members or dumped by callous officials, the local administration had strongly denied the same, asserting that none of the deceased was a local resident, and the bodies had flown downstream from adjoining UP districts.