The body of a 61-year-old man in Odisha’s Jajpur district remained stranded on the rooftop of his house for nearly 18 hours as rising floodwaters prevented his family from taking it down for final rites, his relatives stated on Friday.
The tragic incident was reported from Chintasahi under Bari panchayat, where several families have been marooned for the last six days due to overflowing water from the Brahmani and Kharasrota rivers.
The deceased, identified as 61-year-old Hrushikesh Mallik, passed away at around 4:30 PM on Wednesday.
With the ground floor of their house submerged under approximately four feet of water, his family was forced to keep the body on the rooftop for safekeeping, according to relatives.
It was only when the floodwaters began to recede on Thursday that the family was able to bring the body down from the roof.
The family alleged that despite contacting local officials for support to move the body for the last rites, they did not receive any help.
“We repeatedly called the Bari Block Development Officer (BDO) for administrative assistance for the last rites of my uncle, but the calls were not answered. We then approached a power boat operator engaged by the local administration for rescue operations in the area for assistance, who said he could not go to the village without instructions from higher authorities,” said Anil Mallik, nephew of the deceased.
Eventually, a local social worker intervened and organized a hearse to transport the body for cremation.
Villagers had to carry the body through waist-deep water for nearly a kilometre because the main motorable road connecting the house remained completely flooded.
Finding dry ground locally for the cremation proved nearly impossible, forcing the family to transport the body to the Jajpur district headquarters to perform the last rites, they said.
However, Bari BDO Minati Jagdev refuted the allegations of neglect, stating she had not been made aware of the situation.
“No one has informed me about the incident. I learned about it from a local scribe on Friday afternoon. The nodal officer of Bari panchayat has been asked to provide financial assistance under Harischandra Yojana and other facilities to the family of the deceased for the last rites,” Jagdev clarified.
The incident has sparked widespread outrage among local residents, who alleged that hundreds of families in Chintasahi have been stranded on rooftops for six days without access to cooked meals.
Villagers said that the local administration has only distributed dry rations, failing to provide cooked food relief in the affected areas.
