Bodies go missing from Odisha burial ground, probe ordered

Bhadrak: Bodies of five villagers allegedly went missing from a graveyard in Odisha’s Bhadrak district, prompting the authorities to order a detailed investigation, a police officer said on Sunday.

Police said the bodies were found missing from Maninathpur village cremation ground situated on the banks of the Baitarani river under Bhandaripokhari police station limits of the coastal district on Thursday night.

“I have received a complaint from the villagers of Maninathpur on Sunday about the disappearance of five bodies from the village cremation ground,” said Rajlakshmi Nayak, inspector in-charge (IIC) of Bhandaripokhari police station.

According to Nayak, the missing bodies belonged to Khageswar Samal, Hatabandhu Beuria, Kartik Nayak, Saraswati Behera, and Kalandi Behera, who died in the last two months.

At the Swargadwar cremation ground located on the Baitarani riverbed, bodies are traditionally buried after funeral rites.

However, it was not the first such incident in the village. In 2016, villagers had discovered that the body of a child had been dug out two months after his death, said Solampur panchayat Paramananda Nayak. In the same year, the body of Anam Behera was also exhumed from his grave.

The bodies of Basanta Das, who died in a road accident, and headmaster Basudev Das went missing from the cremation ground the next year, he said.

Three more bodies went missing in June 2023, prompting the villagers to lodge a complaint at the police station. On April 1, 2025, when the son of Rukmini Samal, who had died of cardiac arrest, visited the burial site during the tenth-day ritual and found the grave dug up and the body missing.

Water and liquor bottles were found at the site, and nearly 200 meters away, decomposed flesh and parts of clothes were discovered. Her husband, Srimanta, had also lodged a complaint with the police at that time, another villager said.

Villagers suspect that the bodies may have been stolen for occult practices, scientific experiments, or some other purposes.

The locals alleged that the police did not give adequate importance to the complaints lodged so far.

Bhadrak SP Manoj Rout has directed IIC Bhandaripokhari Police station to investigate the repeated missing of bodies.

“The IIC Bhandaripokhari police station was directed to inquire into the incidents and submit a report,” he said.