Nasir Ali Khan and his younger sister Zakira did not want to believe that one of the several caskets lined up along the corridor leading from the mortuary to the OPD at Panipat Civil Hospital could contain a charred body vaguely resembling their Baaji (elder sister).

But reaching the hospital at 10 am after a night-long journey from Rampur in UP, they were told to check Casket No. 45 by Inspector Sat Prakash.

“No, this is not my sister. Look how this poor woman’s body is charred and shrunken. My baaji Ara Jahan was a beautiful, healthy woman and as tall as my brother Nasir,” says a weeping Zakira.

On Sunday, Nasir Ali Khan had put his sister on the Attari Special. Now he can’t forget how she kept saying she wanted to stay on in his country with her siblings. “Look how she has stayed on in our country as she wished,” says Nasir. “I had told her that she had to go home to her children. She had come home to us, her maika, in Rampur after nine years last month and had done a lot of shopping. Now all has gone up in flames.”

Another two hours go by as the brother-sister duo peer into one casket after another —- 46,47,49, 21. As they see the badly burnt bodies, Zakira and Nasir start losing hope if they will be able to recognise their sister if they eventually find her.

The next number on their list is Casket Number 31. “The police say it may be her,” mumbles the brother. As the search is on, they get a phone call from Aurangi in Pakistan. It is Nasir’s brother-in-law, Mubarak Ali Khan, calling up to find out about his 55-year-old wife.

... contd.