TEAM HERALD
MARGAO: Anxiety was writ large on the face of Tulho Velip, a resident of Barcem village, as he came to the Hospicio mortuary on Monday morning. The reason was simple: His nephew Krishna Velip has gone missing in Saturday’s Canacona tragedy and Tulho travelled to Margao to ascertain whether Krishna was amongst the dead preserved in the hospital mortuary.
Anand Velip is another case in point. He had come to Hospicio early Monday morning to take possession of the body of his close relative, but was made to wait for over an hour for no fault of his.
Indeed, with the rescue operations making no major headway and the administration unable to put a system in place, relatives of the dead are literally running from pillar to post to take possession of bodies of their near and dear ones.
Tulho said the family has been trying to find out Krishna’s whereabouts ever since injured Laxman Gaonkar, also a native of Barcem, who escaped with injuries, informed the family that Krishna was working in the building. “From Canacona we have come to Margao to find out whether Krishna’s body is lying in the morgue. But we could not find the body either at the Hospicio mortuary or the morgue located atop the TB hospital. What are we supposed to do now? We now plan to travel to the Goa Medical College mortuary to find out whether Krishna’s body is lying there”, he said.
An agitated Barcem panch member Arjun Velip came down heavily on the authorities for their callous attitude towards the relatives of the dead or injured. “When we went to the Canacona police station to lodge a missing report, the police told us that Barcem comes under the jurisdiction of Cuncolim police. We finally reached the Cuncolim police station late last night to register our case. Will the authorities maintain the same stand if people from the upper caste were hit by the tragedy?” Arjun questioned, adding that the politicians only use and exploit the common man during elections. Anand Velip, who had travelled to Hospicio this morning along with other relatives to take possession of the body of Subhash Dev Gaonkar added: “When we reached Hospicio mortuary, they told us the body of Subhash was lying at the TB hospital morgue. At the TB hospital morgue they told us that there was no staff. We were made to wait for over an hour, before they made the arrangements.”
