Bhopal, May 20 (IANS) The Madhya Pradesh Police on Wednesday urged the family of Twisha Sharma to take custody of her mortal remains from AIIMS Bhopal after the institute said the body requires minus 80 degrees Celsius storage to prevent decomposition — a facility the hospital does not have.

Twisha Sharma, wife of Samarth Singh, died on May 12 in her home in the Katara Hills area. Police said the death was due to an alleged suicide. Her post-mortem was conducted at AIIMS Bhopal on May 13, and the body has been kept in the institute’s mortuary since then.

In the letter, which the Katara Hills Police Station wrote to the father of Twisha Sharma, it said, “Currently, the body is being preserved at a temperature of minus 4degrees Celsius within the AIIMS Bhopal mortuary.”

The Katara Hills Police station further stated that the communication issued following an advisory received from the AIIMS, Bhopal. “On the night of May 18, 2026, the Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology at AIIMS Bhopal issued a written communication stating that, in order to prevent decomposition, the body ought to be stored at a temperature of -80 degrees Celsius — a facility that is currently unavailable at AIIMS Bhopal.”

It further stated that the standard mortuary freezers operate between minus 4 degrees and 4 degrees, which slows but does not halt decomposition over long periods. With the body lying at AIIMS Bhopal for eight days, the letter noted there is now “a high probability of decomposition setting in”.

“You are hereby informed that the police have no objection to a re-postmortem being conducted. However, given that the deceased’s body has been stored in the mortuary for an extended period, you are humbly requested to make arrangements to take custody of the deceased’s body,” it stated.

The family has refused to take custody until a second post-mortem is conducted outside Madhya Pradesh. It moved an application before the magistrate court in Bhopal on Tuesday seeking the examination at AIIMS, New Delhi.

The family said an “independent medical opinion from a premier national institution will help restore public confidence in the investigation”.

Police said the investigation under the Dowry Prohibition Act is ongoing. The magistrate’s court is expected to take up the family’s plea for a second autopsy later in the day.

–IANS

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