St George’s Hospital Opens New 24-Body Morgue in Mumbai

Times News Network

Mumbai: Eight years after a state govt sanction, St George’s Hospital near CSMT got a new morgue that can store 24 bodies as against three previously.

The new morgue, inaugurated on Tuesday, is spacious and has an entry from the P Dmello Road and a viewing gallery where students can watch dissection. “The project was sanctioned in 2018, but work only began in 2021. The first delay was caused by the escalation of costs,” said a state official. Then the authorities had to work on clearing the access road from P D Mello Road of encroachments. Also, the facility didn’t have power lines that needed a fresh sanction of over Rs 1 crore.

State-run St George’s Hospital played a central role during calamities such as bomb blasts, terror attacks and the Covid pandemic, but its morgue only had a capacity for three bodies.

The idea of a new mortuary came about after Renu Kapoor of Colaba ALM (advance locality management) started a ‘dignity in death’ campaign after visiting the hospital in 2017 for her driver’s post-mortem; her campaign led to a proposal for the existing mortuary’s upgrade in 2018. “This is the success of a citizen’s initiative,” she said.