Encasing vanity in cardboard

Saturday 29th May, 2021

An increasing number of cremations owing to pandemic deaths is said to have led to a shortage of firewood in India; other countries, where the Covid-19 mortality rates have reached unmanageable levels, are struggling to bury the dead, and facing a shortage of coffins. A few moons ago, even the US had to make do with freezer trucks in preserving corpses pending burial because mortuaries were overflowing. It is feared that the pandemic mortality rate will increase exponentially in this country as well unless drastic action is taken to curb the spread of the virus. This may be the reason why the government has decided to keep the country under the current lockdown continuously until 07 June.

The prevailing pandemic, especially its close association with the Grim Reaper, has turned the world on its head, and brought about a radical change in human thinking, especially attitudes, as never before. Sri Lankans are given to wasting colossal amounts of money on weddings and funerals and getting into debt as a result. Today, weddings and funerals have become low-key affairs, at least for the ordinary public, but expensive, ornate coffins continue to sell. The Dehiwala-Mount Lavinia Municipal Council has come out with an innovative solution. It has introduced a low-cost, eco-friendly coffin made of cardboard. This is a salutary initiative, which deserves praise and encouragement. Cardboard coffins have been in use in some other parts of the world.

The locally produced cardboard coffin has been priced at Rs. 10,000, we are told. One wonders if its price could be brought down for the benefit of the poor.

In this day and age, it defies comprehension why so much of money is spent on boxes that are either buried or burnt with the dead. Time was when funerals were actually for the dead, who were thought to need clothes and valuables in the next life. They were mummified and entombed together with a part of their belongings. Pyramids, or sarcophagi were built for them. Such practices have died out, but some wealthy people are said to believe in cryonics, which is to deep freeze corpses in the hope that they could be revived one day. Cryogenic freezer farms are already available, according to media reports. The greed of the super-rich seems to survive even death! The question is whether science, which has so far failed even to prevent deaths due to coronavirus and terminal diseases satisfactorily will ever be able revive frozen corpses. Hope, however, seems to spring eternal even in frozen human breasts.

Today, it is said that funerals are not for the dead but for the living. Hence attempts to make them as grand as possible, and the prohibitive prices of coffins. In most cases, the bereaved make their way to loan sharks, sobbing while undertakers laugh all the way to the bank. If the cardboard coffins are promoted with the public being made to realise the futility of spending huge amounts of money they cannot afford on boxes that decay or get burnt with the dead, a solution to this problem may be possible.

The Islamic way of disposing corpses is the best way, in our book, as it involves the least amount of money and time and is eco-friendly, but if anyone cannot bring himself or herself to be so simple and realistic, then the cardboard box should be considered an alternative.

Life is said to be an arduous journey from dust to dust, and, therefore, a cardboard box facilitates the final phase of this process very effectively. Coffins made of other materials, in fact, impede this natural process to a considerable extent. On, the other hand, why should funerals be allowed to make undertakers and loggers happy by burning or burying valuable wooden boxes?

Religious leaders, especially the Maha Sangha, opinion makers and other influential persons should promote the cardboard coffins which will help not only save trees but also mitigate the pecuniary woes of the bereaved, who otherwise have to beg or borrow to bury their departed ones just for show. The dead would weep if they knew the financial difficulties their funerals cause to their beloved family members. So, cardboard coffins may be a consolation for the departed as well.