“The fire within”

Referring to your editorial "The fire within” (Parsiana, March 7, 2007), there is absolutely no possibility of accumulated dry leaves and dead wood catching fire due to solar concentrators, as stated by you. There are no dry leaves or dead wood in the dakhmas as there are no trees above them. Moreover, I had personally seen the inside of dakhmas during the construction of the Grand Paradi buildings.

The only possibility is that the fire occurred due to experimentation by the Bombay Parsi Punchayet (BPP) to ensure that rotting bodies are disposed of and the dakhmas are cleared of heaps of corpses. Since the matter is in court, an attempt may have been made by advocates of dakhmenashini to prove that solar concentrators are working well in what may well be termed Operation Hush Up. The rotting bodies may have been covered with some kind of acid, kerosene, petrol or flammable chemicals like phosphorous which may have caused this inexplicable fire.

I feel that the community deserves a true and correct explanation by the BPP on the cause of the fire. The community also deserves to know how many bodies were cremated in this fire and how the flames were put out.

There have been rumors in the past that dakhmas are being used by the drug mafia and bootleggers, with the connivance of khandhias and nassessalars, as godowns to store the contraband consignments. Could some such consignment have caught fire? Is there any valid explanation from the BPP?

You have also stated that as per the Vendidad all dakhmas should be demolished after 50 years. So why are we using the same dakhma for over two centuries in violation of the Vendidad? What do our high priests have to say? Sorry, no explanations from the self-appointed scholar are acceptable. In one of the books brought out by the BPP, Dr Firoze Kotwal has opined that the life of a dakhma is 300 years. I request Kotwal to state his reasons for this instead of the 50 years prescribed by the Vendidad.

One important question playing on my mind is that Parsis came to India some 1,300 years ago but the oldest dakhma is around 250 years old. How were the bodies disposed of before construction of the dakhmas? Is there any record of this? As per the misguiding ‘messiah’ of our community, the soul will continue to roam if the dead body is not consigned to the dakhma. Must I presume that the souls of our forefathers whose bodies were not consigned to dakhmas are still roaming around the globe?

HOMI DALAL

Perth, Australia