Latest update March 28th, 2024 12:59 AM
Sep 14, 2009 News
The Essequibo Funeral Parlour which is currently run by the Region Two Administration is at the center of tough criticisms after five families who recently used the service for the month of August–September complained about the grossly decomposed condition their relatives’ corpses were in when it was handed over to them.
The funeral parlour was previously run by private management. One of the victims was Sagar Ramadan, who died on September 3 of hypertension and had to have his cremation brought forward due to the premature decomposition of his corpse.
In an interview with this newspaper, his sister Jagdai Parag said, she and her two sisters and brother came back to Guyana with the intent of making preparations for a proper funeral for their brother.
She sadly reported that all plans to have a funeral had to be forcefully aborted after they were informed by family members who had visited the parlour earlier on the day of the funeral to prepare and uplift the dead for cremation, that her brother’s body was already spoilt.
The irate woman said when they called the parlour, persons there assured them that everything was in order.
However, when the family showed up later in the day at the parlour they learnt it wasn’t so. She said immediately the family had to resort to making other plans to dispose of the dead immediately. Pagar said her brother’s corpse was already swollen and a fowl stench was emanating from it.
The distraught woman described not being able to view her brother’s corpse and perform his Hindu rituals before cremation was most embarrassing. She said immediately other plans had to be made for those who had already queued up at her mother’s Sparta residence to attend the cremation at the La Union site.
She stated that family members want some answers as to why her brother’s body was handed over to them in such a horrible state.
According to Pagar, what will forever live with them is the fact that they had journeyed from so far and yet were denied the opportunity of seeing their relative’s corpse and perform his Hindu rituals for the last.
Deomattie Manni, another woman who recently lost her mother, Omadai Shivgobin, told this newspaper that her mother spent one day at the morgue and the following day her body was swollen to a size forcing them to also bring forward her cremation.
She said her mother’s body was left lying on the parlour’s floor unattended the entire time it was there and a sledge hammer had to be used to break her mother’s shoulder so as to get her out of the ice box. Manni said that a sum of $85,000 was charged for ‘nothing’.
Additionally, her mother’s corpse had to be immediately disposed of in the parlour’s compound. This newspaper had also spoken to Doolmattie Persaud of Perseverance, whose sister Somattie was another victim of the parlour.
Somattie had died recently and like the others, her body was badly decomposed, forcing an early cremation. Chairman of the Essequibo Funeral Parlour said the facility is faced with inexperienced staff.
THIS IDIOT TELLING GUYANA WE HAVE NO SAY IN THE 50% PROFIT SHARING AGREEMENT WE HAVE WITH EXXON.
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