Nepal Flood Survivors Hold Kusha Rites for 1,200 Dead as Mourning Shelters Run Out
Updated
Updated · Inquirer.net · Sep 3
Nepal Flood Survivors Hold Kusha Rites for 1,200 Dead as Mourning Shelters Run Out
3 articles · Updated · Inquirer.net · Sep 3
Summary
Eight days after the August 26 Bhotekoshi floods, families of missing victims have begun symbolic funeral rites with kusha grass effigies because bodies remain unfound or hard to identify.
More than 1,200 bodies have been recovered and thousands are still missing, while floodwaters also destroyed homes, leaving many survivors without any place to observe the 13-day mourning rituals.
Two Kathmandu-area kiriyaputri shelters are already full—one hosting eight groups and another filling all eight rooms before adding six tent rooms—yet families still wait outside or are turned away.
Victims say rapid burials in mass graves and shortages of basic supplies such as LP gas have compounded the strain as they try to complete rites far from their ruined villages.
The disaster swept away more than 7,000 houses and destroyed riverside settlements, bridges and roads, turning private grief into a wider humanitarian and cultural crisis.