The first worry -- decomposition. March 16th 1993

A few hours after I arrived and after catching up with family to the best of my ability, I was told that I had to go to the morgue to claim the body. My brother said he would do so instead. To this day, I am incredibly grateful to him for doing this. I slipped away into a sleep for a few minutes and I was woken up at 5 AM and someone (an uncle? a cousin? my brother?) saying that the body was downstairs. Why wasn't it brought up, I asked. Come downstairs, someone urgently whispered. There were uncles and aunts and cousins milling around at 5 AM. My mom was wailing in her bedroom. I walked downstairs. It was still dark and I peered around looking for the car or van that had brought the body home.My brother and uncle and cousin asked everyone else to clear out a bit. My uncle (my dad's elder brother) cleared his throat and asked, "Shall we bring it up?". I stood there stupefied. Nothing had prepared me for this moment. My brother came up to me and said, "You should see the body". He is five years younger than I am but his voice had an urgency that I could not ignore.
I don't know what I said next but I walked up to the back of the van and climbed in.
As I did that, I touched the leg of my father's body. It was hard. Hard as a rock. Rigor mortis? I didn't know. I shifted up to the head.
What I saw took my breath away.
This was a decomposed body of someone who had faced an incredible blast.
I couldn't have my father moved upstairs for his body to be viewed in this terrible state. Especially by my mother.
The funeral ceremonies were scheduled for Noon.
Hundreds of people were due to come to the ceremonies.
I couldn't move the body up.
I couldn't leave it down here to decompose more in the heat as the temperatures rose.
What was I to do?
I thought about it for a minute and then decided.
We were going to go ahead with the ceremony right now at 5:30 AM without waiting for the official timetable.
An aunt of mine, who had earlier been reprimanded by me for espousing BJP like beliefs loudly, was not downstairs and started talking loudly about how this was unacceptable and the body must come in to the house for a Puja.
She went upstairs and told my mom who came downstairs and started wailing about how she wanted to look at my dad one more time. Several relatives who were much older than I am started talking about overturning my decision.
I lost it.
I looked at my aunt in her eyes and told her that she was welcome to challenge me after she looked my father's face close up.
She stopped.
Then she balked.
My father's body, still in the van, was covered up.
I let everyone around know that I was making these decisions and they had no say in it.
The next thing I remember - we were in the crematorium. The word had gotten around and there were a couple of hundred people in attendance. I do not remember much from that hour except burying my face in my mom's lap when the grief became too much for me. The body was lowered into the electric crematorium after some of the pujas were done. Someone pressed what I think was a red button.
Then we waited.
I heaved a sigh of relief that very few peope had seen my father's face.
We waited for the body to burn up and collect some of his ashes.
My journey - post his murder - was just begining. I had no idea that it would take me forever to recover. But I no longer had my first worry to worry about.