For Hrishikesh Pandey, the scene outside Mahaveer Ghat in Ballia in Uttar Pradesh was reminiscent of the endless summer of 2021. A long queue of grieving people stood outside the ghat, each family carrying a body in their arms. “The last time I saw such a situation was during the COVID-19 pandemic,” he said.
Hrishikesh, a retired chemistry faculty member from the Satish Chandra College in Ballia, was at the ghat on the banks of the river Ganga with his friend Subharanshu Shekhar Pandey. On the evening of June 14, Subharanshu’s wife, Shashi Prabha, 68, went for a bath. When she came out, she complained of high fever. Subharanshu gave her paracetamol, but the fever would not subside. “The next morning, Prabha became unconscious. When we took her to the hospital, the doctors declared her dead,” said Subharanshu, a lawyer.
More agony followed. Subharanshu and his son Amit, 40, took the body to the ghat for cremation, but they were forced to wait for hours just to collect wood from a nearby shop because of the winding queue. The wait was also painful as the temperature had soared to more than 43°C. Earlier this summer, the India Meteorological Department (IMD) had warned about potential heat-related casualties across the country.
