Asok Kontare, a 39-year-old vegetable seller in the western Indian city of Pune, had already borrowed money to pay for his sister’s treatment before she died in a private hospital two weeks after he contracted coronavirus.
As he struggled to overcome the tragedy, had to deal with the financial problems that worsened with the death of his sister.
The only available hearse driver charged 5,000 Indian rupees ($ 68) for a 6-kilometer journey to the nearest crematorium – five times the usual price. When Contare arrived there was a long line of corpses waiting for more than a day. He agreed to pay 7,000 rupees to go further on the waiting list.
“I have been living in a terrible condition for 15 days,” he said. “I could not sleep or eat normally. I wanted this to end as soon as possible and I did not mind paying an unreasonable amount. “
Deficiencies even in timber for funeral fires
The second wave of coronavirus in India has caused shortages not only of oxygen, medicines and hospital beds but also in timber for funeral fires, hearses and crematoriums, as a result, people like Contare are forced to pay huge sums to say goodbye to their loved ones.
India announces by far the highest number of new daily cases in the world and more than 4,000 deaths a day – numbers that are almost certainly lower than the real ones, according to experts.
The majority of Hindus in India burn their dead and the high death toll creates huge queues at incinerators and shortages of human hands and raw materials.
“There is a huge demand for firewood used in funeral fires at incinerators, but supplies are not enough,” said Rohit Pardesi, a firewood trader in Satara in the western state of Maharashtra.
Due to the local lockdown that aims to reduce the pandemic, there is a shortage of lumberjacks while even those who are available ask for a higher reward.
“This has created a shortage of fuel wood and has pushed up prices,” Pardesi said.
The retail price of timber fuel has risen by at least 30% and has more than doubled in some areas, said another timber trader in the same city.
In the northern Indian state of Uttar Pradesh, 24-year-old Mukul Chaundari is facing similar problems after the death of his mother in the capital Lucknow.
The driver of the ambulance that transported his mother to the hospital for 5,000 rupees, charged even more to transport her to the incinerator. “We had to ask him not to charge us more,” Chaundari said.
The wood for the cremation cost twice as much as the normal price, while the priest who led the funeral owed the family 5,000 rupees – two to five times the usual amount.
Rokhti Zhangam, a Hindu priest in Satara, said many priests refuse to go to incinerators because they are afraid, while those who are willing to do so charge more.
“It is very difficult to lead a funeral for someone who died of coronavirus,” he said. “If someone asks, I do, but I charge more as I take the risk.” However, he refused to say how much he charges.
Illegal oxygen trade
For Covid patients who manage to survive, The medical supplies trade on the black market is galloping, with desperate patients paying huge sums in a still low-income country.
In the capital New Delhi, oxygen cylinders change hands even for 70,000 rupees, according to relatives of victims – 20 times the normal price and multiples of the average Indian’s monthly salary.
Police have made more than 100 arrests in connection with excessive charges for drugs, ambulance services and hospital beds.
Arvina Sarma, a 28-year-old lawyer from Noida, a New Delhi satellite city, has helped more than 10 COVID patients who are friends and relatives secure oxygen and medical supplies last month. Almost all of them paid much more money.
“They are like predators,” he said, referring to those who sell drugs on the black market.
“You are standing in front of me with something that might save my life and you are just looking at my pocket.”
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