Bodies of COVID-19 victims among those dumped in India's Ganges -govt document

FILE PHOTO: A man wearing a protective suit touches the body of his relative, who died from the coronavirus disease (COVID-19), before his cremation on the banks of the river Ganges at Garhmukteshwar in the northern state of Uttar Pradesh, India, May 6, 2021. REUTERS/Danish Siddiqui

NEW DELHI (Reuters) -Bodies of COVID-19 victims have been found dumped in some Indian rivers, a state government said in a letter seen by Reuters, the first official acknowledgement of an alarming practice it said may stem from poverty and fear of the disease in villages.

Images of corpses drifting down the Ganges river, which Hindus consider holy, have shocked a nation reeling under the world's worst surge in infections.