Haryana DGP acknowledges lapses in handling of Yuvraj Manchanda’s body

Gurugram Police recovered the decomposed body on September 10 but uploaded its details on ZIPNET only on September 16, two days after cremation.

Haryana director general of police Ajay Singhal on Monday acknowledged certain lapses in the handling of the body of murdered Delhi man Yuvraj Singh Manchanda, whose decomposed body was recovered from sewage-filled land in Badshahpur, while defending the three-day preservation procedure followed by Gurugram Police for unidentified bodies.

Haryana DGP acknowledges lapses in handling of Yuvraj Manchanda’s body

“But there were certain lapses of which the court (Delhi) has taken cognisance. We will look into it and will amend our instructions. We will issue appropriate directions,” Singhal said in response to Hindustan Times’ query on whether the state police headquarters had issued any directions after the handling of Manchanda’s unidentified body.

“Let me clarify for you that we have specific standard operating procedures. If we find a body here, we can’t keep it for more than three days; otherwise, it will rot. We followed the standard operating procedure and cremated it accordingly,” he said.

Singhal was speaking to the media after inaugurating a new building for the Sector-17/18 police station along the MG Road.

Manchanda, a resident of Sarita Vihar, went missing after leaving for Gurugram from Lajpat Nagar market on the evening of September 6. His family filed a missing complaint at the Lajpat Nagar police station on September 11, and Delhi Police registered a first information report and uploaded his details, including his photograph, on the inter-state Zonal Integrated Police Network portal on the same day.

Gurugram Police had recovered a highly decomposed, unidentified body from sewage-filled land in Badshahpur on the morning of September 10. The body was preserved for 72 hours and cremated on September 14 following an autopsy, along with belongings including clothes. Details were simultaneously uploaded on the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and the Systems Unidentified Dead Body Recovery Database.

However, the investigating officer, an assistant sub-inspector posted at Badshahpur police station who was later suspended, uploaded details of the recovery and photographs on the Zonal Integrated Police Network, used by Gurugram, Delhi and a few other states, only on the evening of September 16, two days after the cremation.

The six-day gap between recovery and uploading the details that a Sikh person’s body was found, that too on the ‘Unidentified person found’ section, on the inter-state portal, has become the focus of the controversy.

Delhi police had detained Manchanda’s ex-colleague Anya Vats and her partner Saiyam Sachdeva from Kainchi Dham in Uttarakhand when they confessed to murdering him in Gurugram and dumping his body in sewage water on the evening of September 16 when they finally got to know that Gurugram police had recovered a decomposed body at the same location and had cremated it.

Manchanda’s family reached the Badshahpur police station and identified the body and belongings from photographs and alleged that timely uploading could have enabled his identification and given them a chance for cremation.

The lapse was subsequently taken cognisance of by a Delhi court on September 20, 2026, when the Saket court, acting on an application by Manchanda’s sister, directed Gurugram Police to preserve and produce all police, forensic, medical and digital records relating to the recovery and cremation of the unidentified body and flagged the alleged failure to upload details on ZIPNET before cremation.