Yesterday, the Apex Court held that there is a need to have a uniform national policy on the handling of dead bodies to the family member of the deceased. 

A bench comprising Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and justices P S Narasimha and J B Pardiwala shared the suffering of a lawyer who said his client could neither see the face of his dead mother nor perform her last rites during the pandemic despite the fact she did not die of COVID-19.

“We can’t remove your anguish but we can create an opportunity to make it better for others,” said the bench.

The bench also directed solicitor general Tushar Mehta to share a copy of the existing national policy on the handling of dead bodies with the lawyer.

In this reply, solicitor general, Tushar Mehta said that the union did come up with guidelines and they provided several measures including allowing family members of the dead to have ‘darshan’ of bodies from a distance.

“There is a need to have a uniform national policy on this,” the bench said.

“It is not something we should even defend. It is something which if it happens to any of us would be as painful,” the law officer said.

The case is titled as ‘Proper Treatment of COVID-19 Patients and Dignified Handling of Dead Bodies in Hospitals etc’.

The top court listed the plea in August.