Date:24/02/2007 URL: http://www.thehindu.com/2007/02/24/stories/2007022417341400.htm

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Bodies of six train attack victims buried

Unidentified bodies to be buried today

Mehrana (Haryana): They came to India to meet their near and dear ones; now this country across the border has become the final resting place for five Pakistanis who died in the Samjhauta Express fire-bombing.

Five days after 68 people were killed in the midnight attack on the trans-border train, the bodies of five Pakistani nationals and an Indian were buried as per Islamic rituals in this Haryana village, about 5km from Panipat.

The relatives of the Pakistani victims — a couple and a woman and her two children — gave the consent to bury them here as they could not afford to take their bodies back home.

The bodies of Mamoona, her daughter Anam and son Burkham, Yunuf Naseem and his wife Mariam Begum, all from Karachi, and Anwar, who hailed from Gujarat, wrapped in white, were buried side by side in an emotionally charged atmosphere as Islamic scholars read the Namaaz-i-Janaaza (funeral prayers). Specials prayers were held earlier in memory of the departed souls.

Senior district administration officials, Haryana Wakf Board chairman Mohammad Shaheen and local villagers were present.

The unidentified bodies of the victims will be buried here on Saturday as authorities said they could not preserve the corpses any longer.

The local administration today got clearance from the Ministry of External Affairs for mass burial.

So far, 38 of the 68 people killed in the blasts have been identified.

Another batch of relatives of the Pakistani victims is expected to reach here by Saturday morning and the authorities have decided to give them time till 12 noon for identifying the bodies.

Meanwhile, at the Wagah border, Indian border guards handed over the remains of seven victims to their Pakistani counterparts.

A total of 19 bodies have been returned to family members in the past two days. — Agencies