Police on Thursday retrieved the body of an elderly woman from a well and cremated it at Patpur panchayat under Bahragora police station area of Ghatshila sub-division, around 90km from the steel city.

Sulochana Nayak, 61, a resident of Mohanpur village in Patpur panchayat, had died at home on Wednesday. According to the district administration rules, the body was taken to the primary health centre where a swab sample was taken for Covid-19 test. After the sample tested negative, health department officials handed the body over to her kin.

The family members took the body for cremation at the nearest cremation ground on Wednesday evening. However, a section of villagers opposed the cremation fearing the spread of the novel coronavirus.

The bereaved family members carried the body to a nearby dry well and dumped it into it. As news of the body being dropped into a dry well reached the Baharagora police station, a police team reached the well on Wednesday night but could find only the plastic sheet the body had been wrapped with. On Thursday morning, the police team went to the well again, retrieved the body and cremated it.

“We have decided to register a case against those who had objected to the cremation of the body and also against those who dropped the body into the dry well instead of getting it cremated,” superintendent of police (rural) Piyush Pandey told The Telegraph.

Fear goes viral

The fear of getting infected with the novel coronavirus is getting so widespread that incidents of panic and insensitivity are rising.

A 40-year-old man, who lives as a tenant in a house on Gurudwara Road in Mango, returned home on his motorbike early morning on Thursday. As soon as his neighbours spotted him, they became anxious and informed the police as well as the Covid-19 control room to take him away to be quarantined and medically tested for Covid-19.

“The man was not at home for the past three months but suddenly returned home. We do not know where he has come from. What if he turns out to be a coronavirus-positive?” a neighbour of the man, who requested anonymity, told The Telegraph.

In another incident, a section of neighbours created a hue and cry after a police officer from Gumla district came to his relative’s house at Jahartola in Baridih. The neighbours were pacified after a health department team turned up and arranged for the police officer to remain in home quarantine.