To facilitate better handling of law and order along with helping in quick investigation, the government has issued directives both to the police department as well as the health department to carry out post-mortems even after sunset.

The entire process will be videographed.

An order in this regard was issued by Additional Chief Secretary (Health) Amit Mohan Prasad on Tuesday.

Significantly, on November 15, the Central government had issued an order to conduct a post-mortem after sunset. In this, all the states were asked to make arrangements for conducting post-mortem even after sunset.

On Tuesday, Amit Mohan Prasad, in an order sent to the director general of health and its copy to the police department, said that arrangements should be made to conduct post-mortems in all hospitals even during the night.

Where there are arrangements, the post-mortem should be started at night.  In other places, similar arrangements will be made as soon as possible, the order stated.

The director general of health said that this decision would give relief to the families of the deceased as well as help the police in maintaining law and order besides facilitating investigation.

Organ transplantation will also be encouraged by not delaying the post-mortem process. The post-mortem will be videographed so that in case of any legal dispute, it can be put up as evidence. The post-mortem of murder, suicide, suspicious cases, mutilated bodies etc. will not be done at night, but in these cases, the post-mortem will be done by forming a panel if there are circumstances related to law and order.