Twenty three human bodies were extricated debris lying in Kedarnath and consigned to flames after necessary rituals on Friday. This takes the number of bodies disposed of at the Himalayan shrine 188 since the start of operations over a month ago, police said. On Thursday they had cremated 25 bodies after collecting their identity.
The process of extricating the bodies from under heaps of rubble lying close to the shrine which witnessed massive devastation in the June calamity was frequently hampered by bad weather and lack of heavy stone cutting equipment with the police and NDRF personnel engaged in the operation.
For the identification of the bodies, Police had collected DNA samples and photographed the bodies. A bag containing voter identity card, debit card, mark sheet and bank account number was recovered from a dead body while some jewelry was recovered from other bodies.
These bodies were severely decomposed and extracted from debris at around Kedarnath Temple area. The police team is camping in Kedarnath and the work of extracting the bodies from debris will continue on Saturday.
Police and NDRF personnel are jointly carrying out the exercise under the supervision of DIG G S Martoliya, they said.