"Send Us The Video": Daughters Skip Father's Funeral, Care Home Staff Perform Last Rites In Haryana

A heartbreaking incident from Sonipat, Haryana, has highlighted a painful reality of changing family bonds and the loneliness faced by many elderly people. Former wealthy cloth merchant Shivcharan Ratan Gupta passed away at a care home without a single family member beside him. In his final days, he longed to see his three daughters, but none of them visited him during his illness or came to attend his last rites. Instead, they watched his funeral proceedings through a video call.

Shivcharan, who was once a successful textile merchant in Maharashtra, had moved to the Sonipat care home around 18 months ago with his wife, Meena Gupta. After his wife passed away, he continued living at the facility alone, spending his remaining days away from his family.

He had no sons and spent his entire life's earnings on providing his three daughters with a good education and helping them build successful careers. His efforts paid off, with two of his daughters eventually becoming government schoolteachers. His eldest daughter, Anita, is settled in Nepal, where she works as a teacher, while his second daughter, Nisha, lives in Azamgarh, Uttar Pradesh. His youngest daughter, Priya, resides in Mumbai.

Excuses and Absence in Final Moments

According to Anand, the care home manager, Shivcharan kept a mobile phone mainly to stay connected with his children. However, as his health began to deteriorate, calls from his daughters became increasingly infrequent.

“When his condition worsened, we contacted all three daughters and requested them to come and see their father. But each of them gave different reasons and expressed their inability to visit,” Anand said.

He added that after Shivcharan passed away late at night, the care home staff offered to preserve his body for some time to allow the family to arrive and perform the final rites. “Even then, they said they did not have the time to travel and declined to come,” Anand said.

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A heartbreaking incident from Sonipat, Haryana, has highlighted a painful reality of changing family bonds and the loneliness faced by many elderly people. Former wealthy cloth merchant Shivcharan Ratan Gupta passed away at a care home without a single family member beside him.… pic.twitter.com/BYChHouxTT

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Final Rites via Video Call

Rather than attending in person, the eldest daughter, Anita, transferred Rs 5,100 online to the care home management to cover the expenses for the last rites. The family initially requested that his ashes be preserved for them to collect later. However, they subsequently changed their minds, citing time constraints, and requested the care home staff to immerse the ashes in the River Ganges on their behalf.

The daughters monitored the entire funeral process remotely via a video link and requested the staff to send them recorded footage of the cremation. In a video of the conversation between the daughters and caregivers that is now going viral, one of Mr Gupta's daughters can be heard asking, "Ho gaya theek se saara kaam? Aap mujhe video bhej dena ek baar" (Was everything done properly? Please send me the video once). In the clip, she is also heard asking, "Abhi aur kitna time lagega?" (How much more time will it take?), to which the caregiver replies that the process would be completed within 10 to 15 minutes.

The incident has deeply saddened care home staff and local residents alike. "Alongside academic and career success, children must be taught empathy, compassion, and the enduring value of family bonds," said the caregivers who were with Mr Gupta during his final moments.