Kathmandu, Nepal:<\/strong> At the Pashupatinath Temple on the banks of the Bagmati River, families gathered to honour relatives who disappeared after a deadly flood struck the China-Nepal border last month.<\/p>\n Among them was Madan Lal Lawat<\/strong>, who joined other grieving families at the Hindu temple to perform rituals for loved ones whose bodies have not been recovered.<\/p>\n Under Hindu tradition, families can create symbolic effigies from sacred kusha grass<\/strong> when the body of a deceased person cannot be found. The representation allows relatives to carry out traditional last rites and rituals for those presumed to have died.<\/p>\n With more than 5,000 people still missing<\/strong> and authorities having ended rescue operations, the ritual has become one of the few ways families can formally honour their missing relatives.<\/p>\n Lawat lost five relatives in the devastating floods, including his brother. He survived because he was away from his village of Betrawati<\/strong>, driving his bus when the floodwaters struck.<\/p>\n According to Lawat, the last information he received from survivors was that his brother Mangal<\/strong> died while moving from house to house to warn residents to evacuate.<\/p>\n “I don’t know how to start over. Police say they’re still searching for the bodies, but I’m not sure they’ll ever be found,” Lawat said.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n Lawat believes there is little chance that his missing relatives are still alive.<\/p>\n Although families may believe their loved ones died in the disaster, establishing their legal status is much more complicated.<\/p>\n Under Nepalese law, a missing person is generally not legally presumed dead until 12 years<\/strong> have passed. This leaves families facing not only grief and uncertainty but also a lengthy legal process before the deaths of missing relatives can be formally recognised.<\/p>\n For families such as Lawat’s, religious rituals provide a way to say goodbye even when there is no body to bury and no legal certainty over the fate of their loved ones.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Nepal Flood Survivors Turn to Hindu Rituals as Thousands Remain Missing Families Honour Loved Ones Who Disappeared in Deadly Flood Kathmandu, Nepal: At the Pashupatinath Temple on the banks of the Bagmati River, families gathered to honour relatives who disappeared after a deadly flood struck the China-Nepal border last month. Among them was Madan Lal […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":3449,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,512],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3448","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-national","category-nepal"],"gutentor_comment":0,"yoast_head":"\nSacred Grass Effigies Used for Last Rites<\/h2>\n
Five of Lawat’s Relatives Are Still Missing<\/h2>\n
Nepal’s Missing-Person Law Creates Further Uncertainty<\/h2>\n