A woman in India has been cremated at the behest of her husband, but she was suspected of still being alive, police say.
The Times of India reported on Friday that Rachna Sisodia, 24, was allegedly put on the pyre for burning alive by her in-laws.
Two hours before the burning, her body had been released to her husband, Devesh Chaudhary, 23, at Sharda hospital in Greater Noida in northern India's Uttar Pradesh state.
She had been declared dead on February 25 due to lung infection.
According to local sources, police then arrived on the funeral scene and pulled the woman from the fire, believing she was still alive.
A subsequent post-mortem later concluded that Rachna had died of "shock caused by being burnt alive."
The post-mortem investigation found ashes in her respiratory tract.
A hospital spokesperson told the Hindustan Times, "This happens when someone is burnt alive. The particles go inside with the breath. If a person is dead, such particles cannot reach the lungs and windpipe. So the doctors concluded that the woman was burnt alive on the pyre."
However, medics from Sharda hospital claimed at a press conference on Thursday that they had documented proof that the woman had died in hospital.
Doctor Rahul Singh, Sharda hospital’s head of Intensive Care Unit (ICU), said the final diagnosis of the patient revealed she was suffering from acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). "The patient died due to cardiorespiratory arrest."
Meanwhile, the doctor who conducted the post-mortem said that due to the extent of burning he could not say for sure that the corpse he had examined belonged to Rachna or someone else.
The dead woman's husband claimed he was being framed for murdering his wife.
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