A man in Uttar Pradesh’s Basti district has gone viral after staging his own “death” to prove he is alive to protest against alleged bureaucratic negligence.
A man in Uttar Pradesh’s Basti district has gone viral after staging his own “death” to prove he is alive to protest against alleged bureaucratic negligence. The incident unfolded at the district magistrate’s office, where the elderly man, wrapped in a white shroud (kafan) and adorned with a garland, lay motionless on the ground, mimicking a corpse. In a dramatic twist, he suddenly “came back to life,” holding up a handwritten message that read, “DM Saheb, I am alive.”
Declared Dead on Paper
The man has been identified as Ishaq Ali, a retired government employee who claims he has been officially declared dead in land revenue records for over a decade. According to Ali, the error dates back to 2012, seven years before his retirement in 2019. Despite being alive and in service at the time, records allegedly marked him as deceased, stripping him of his legal identity.
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Land Transferred, Identity Erased
Ali has accused revenue inspector Lalit Kumar Mishra of orchestrating the fraudulent entry. He alleges that once he was declared “dead” on paper, his ancestral land was transferred into the name of a woman.
Ali resorted to this stark and symbolic protest and the video has gone viral.
