The tombstones in the area designated for Covid-19 victims in Delhi's biggest Muslim graveyard - the Jadid Qabristan Ahle Islam - tell a story of permanent exile. Many of the bodies here are of patients from states such as Bihar and Uttar Pradesh, individuals who came to Delhi for treatment but could not return to be buried closer to home.
The authorities in the city still do not permit bodies of Covid-19 victims to be taken back to their hometowns because of sanitary protocols, forcing families to bury them in Delhi's graveyards.
This burden of interring the dead from smaller towns and rural parts of the country is one of the contributing factors to a problem for graveyards in big Indian cities as they try to keep pace with the country's growing Covid-19 death toll.
India, which currently has the third-highest number of deaths due to the pandemic, has recorded more than 126,000 fatalities.
The Delhi cemetery carved out nearly one more hectare last month to bury Covid-19 victims after it ran out of previously allocated space. This was its third such allocation since April. A total of around 2.4ha has been earmarked so far and the graveyard now has space for another 500 bodies.
While the number of daily nationwide deaths has fallen to around 500 currently - down from more than a thousand in September - fears of a fresh spike prompted by the ongoing festive season continue to worry graveyard management committees.
If the pandemic gathers pace again, there is a danger of running out of space, Mr Mohammed Shamim, supervisor of the graveyard set up in 1924, told The Straits Times.
At least two smaller Muslim graveyards in Delhi also ran out of space earlier this year, following which the authorities acquired more land.
Another Muslim graveyard in Kopri in Navi Mumbai stopped accepting bodies of Covid-19 victims in September for the same reason. Families who come to bury their dead are being asked to approach other graveyards. It is a problem that has also been reported by Christian cemeteries in Bangalore.
Rapid development in and around Indian cities shrank the space for the dead even before the pandemic. But the Covid-19 crisis has exacerbated the problem with its additional challenges, such as opposition from fearful locals, who have prevented bodies from being buried in neighbouring graveyards.
Government rules also mandate deeper and wider graves for victims of Covid-19, necessitating more space. Such graves are more than 3m deep compared with around 1.2m for others. They are also wider and require additional space in between.
Another key concern is that, unlike non-Covid-19 graves, which are reused, there is no certainty of when graves of Covid-19 victims can be dug up to bury other bodies. "A body decomposes in around two years, following which we reuse the grave, but the government has told us not to touch a Covid grave for at least five years to avoid any spread of infection," said Mr Mohammed Siraj, the treasurer of Noor-ul Islam Trust, which manages the graveyard in Kopri.
The graveyard, which is spread over 2,500 sq m, stopped taking Covid-19 victims after burying its 46th victim in September. Set up 35 years ago, it has already begun reusing its 250 non-Covid-19 graves. "We have written to the government asking for additional land but are yet to hear back from the authorities," he added.
In Bangalore, Christian families with Covid-19 victims were also turned away from some graveyards in September, when the pandemic was peaking in the city. Mr J.A. Kanthraj, the spokesman for the Archdiocese of Bangalore, told The Straits Times that at least six Catholic graveyards faced a space crunch and that some families had to cremate their dead.
The protocol for graves of Covid-19 victims was recently relaxed in Bangalore, easing some of the pressure on city graveyards, but Mr Kanthraj said they were still pressing for more burial land, to mitigate the "serious crisis".
The Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike, the local municipal corporation, has identified space for about 10 burial grounds on the outskirts of the city but has yet to hand over the land.
