LUCKNOW: Authorities in the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh have began investigating how more than 100 bodies, many of them children, ended up floating in an offshoot of the Ganges River.
The 102 bodies found floating near the village of Pariyar in the most populous state of Uttar Pradesh were too badly decomposed for autopsies or identification, District Magistrate Saumya Agarwal said.
DNA testing is being done to determine where the bodies might have come from.
As the curiosity was brewing over the mysterious recoveries, Inspector General of Police (Law and Order) A Satish Ganesh said these were bodies ostensibly of unmarried girls and children who were disposed off in the river by their kin as part of last rites.
While it is illegal to dispose of the dead in rivers, some practicing Hindus believe that giving an unwed girl a water burial will ensure she is born again into the family.
In Delhi, Union Minister for Water Resources and Ganga Cleaning Uma Bharati said, “We have also received information through the media, party workers and ministry officials over the issue.”
The Ganges originates from an ice cave under the Gangotri glacier in the Himalayas and flows 2,525 km (1,569 miles) to drain into the Bay of Bengal. It is a lifeline to hundreds of millions of people who live along its banks, providing them with water and drainage facilities.
The Ganges River is the most sacred river for Hindus who worship it as “Mother Ganges”.
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