Online crematorium reservation; death certificates available in Delhi

In an effort to streamline the process at these facilities, the Municipal Corporation of Delhi (MCD) plans to launch digital transactions and online slot booking services to enable the issuance of death certificates across the 68 funeral homes run by the civic body in Delhi. These announcements were made during the budget proposals on December 9.

The authorities said that in order to lessen the burden on the main Nigam Bodh Ghat cremation site, the corporation’s health department plans to renovate the crematoriums in Sarai Kale Khan and Sector 26, Rohini. Gyanesh Bharti, the municipal commissioner, made the idea to redesign funeral homes.

The Delhi government released its yearly birth and death registration data last week, and it states that the city had 128,106 fatalities or 351 deaths per day on average.

According to a senior city official who wished to remain anonymous, almost 80% of funerals in the Capital are held at cremation sites, with the remaining portion taking place in burial locations. Currently, fifty wood-based crematoriums, six burial sites, three cemeteries, eight CNG crematoriums, and one electric cremation are under the control of the Public Health Department.

The three civic bodies—North, South, and East—were running real-time online counters to display the availability of pyres during the pandemic, according to a second senior MCD official from the public health department. The department is currently working on turning the portal into an online booking unit.

“We often get complaints from families about overcharging and other difficulties. Family members of the dead may buy wood and make online reservations for the time and location using this site. Additionally, a QR code will be created. The funeral homes’ administration may scan the code to finish the last few processes. Human interaction would be decreased as a result, the second official said.

In order to streamline the procedure, Bharti also said in his budget suggestions that all crematoriums will be digitalized and connected to the birth-death registry system.

According to the first official mentioned above, funeral homes now provide manual slips that are utilized for online death registration. “People lose these slips all the time. The information would be sent straight to the central server via computerization and digital slips, the official said.

CNG modernization and conversion

During the pandemic, there was a greater drive to convert crematoriums into CNG-fueled machines, increasing their number from three to eight.

Over the course of the next six months, the local council intends to equip three additional locations—the crematoriums at Hastsal, Panchkuian Road, and Seemapuri—with CNG furnaces.

According to the second MCD official, furnaces and other necessary equipment have already been purchased for the Hastsal and Panchkuian Roads. By December 2023, we want to have the Hastsal facility running. The official said that while the two furnaces in Seemapuri would be integrated with the structure and hence not be operational until June 2024, the one furnace at Panchkuian Road will be operational in ninety days.

The only electric crematorium in Sarai Kale Khan, which serves a sizable amount of unclaimed dead remains, has also been updated by the city council.

The official continued by saying that family customs and beliefs, together with superior amenities at the city’s biggest cremation, now result in a disproportionate burden for the Nigam Bodh Ghat facility.

The official went on, “We think there should be sizable crematoriums in three distinct parts of the city so that bodies can be processed in their respective regions.”

To transform the Rohini Sector 26 land into an integrated facility featuring portions for Muslims, Christians, and Hindus, the local authority has recruited a consultant. Regarding burial grounds, the corporation intends to expand the current facility by developing a 2,000-square-meter property next to Buland Masjid in east Delhi.

Based on the registration statistics, 104,764 fatalities in Delhi were attributed to Hinduism, 16,467 to Islam, 3,690 to Sikhism, 781 to Christianity, and the other deaths were not assigned a specific religion.