KATHMANDU, Sept 7: Families of those killed or missing in the devastating Bhotekoshi flood are completing the 13th day of mourning rituals on Monday, but many face a painful dilemma: they have neither found their loved ones nor enough space to perform the final rites.
Some families have performed funerals using symbolic bodies made from ‘kusha’ grass after their missing relatives failed to return or make contact. With no remains to recover, relatives have assumed they died in the flood and carried out the rituals.
Fifty-seven members of 26 households in Betrawati Bazaar, which was swept away by the flood, remain missing. Their relatives are performing mourning rituals in Kathmandu, with 16 families staying in Dhumbharahi and 10 in Shobha Bhagwati. Because of a shortage of space, several families have had to share rooms while observing the rituals.
Final rites of Bhagarathi Bhatta performed
Traditionally, a single bereaved family stays in one room during the mourning period. But the scale of the disaster has forced three or four families to perform the rites together. Similar shortages have been reported in some of the flood-affected areas.
Many families fled to Kathmandu and other places after the flood destroyed their homes and communities. Relatives say they are struggling even to arrange basic necessities, including cooking utensils, sleeping mats and warm clothes.
Nirajan Paudel, who lost five members of his family, including his parents, uncle, aunt and sister, said two families are sharing a room at a mourning facility in Sunaulo Basti of Tarkeshwor Municipality. After failing to find his relatives alive, his family performed the final rites using symbolic kusha bodies.
Yet the discovery of survivors has given some families hope. Four people listed as missing were rescued alive from debris on the 10th and 11th days after the flood. Among them was 64-year-old Chandrika Shrestha of Betravati, who was found alive on the fourth floor of her collapsed home.
Her son had already begun mourning rituals, believing she was dead. After her rescue, the rituals were stopped on the advice of a priest. Shrestha is receiving treatment at Birendra Army Hospital in Chhauni. Her husband, Anand, remains missing.
Other survivors were rescued from the Trishuli 3A hydropower tunnel and the Upper Trishuli 1 tunnel. These rescues have encouraged families to keep searching for missing relatives.
For some, however, uncertainty remains unbearable. “I have found neither life nor a body,” said Betravati survivor Gyan Kumar Dangol, who lost his parents, wife, brother and several children in the flood. He said he himself was swept away for about 15 minutes before being thrown toward the riverbank and surviving.
Injured and with a broken hand, Dangol said only he and one nephew survived from their family of 10. “I survived, but what am I supposed to do alone? I have lost everything,” he said.
