80-year-old's body found in Mumbai clinic freezer, police baffled by family's plan

Police found the man’s body in a freezer at a Malad clinic after residents alerted them. His family said they were exploring cryonics to preserve him.

For four years, the body of an 80-year-old man lay inside a temperature-controlled freezer at a Malad clinic — while his family quietly explored the possibility of sending him to the US to be preserved indefinitely.

The incident came to light only after residents tipped off the Kurar police on Monday night. (PTI) (Representative Image)

The incident came to light only after residents tipped off the Kurar police on Monday night. When officers reached the polyclinic, they found the elderly man’s corpse inside a freezer. The clinic had itself remained shut for about a month for renovation.

What has left the police baffled is that the man died of natural causes in 2022, according to documents produced by his family, and his body had allegedly been preserved ever since because his children were unable to come to terms with his death.

The family told police that, after the man’s death, they researched cryonics — an experimental practice in which legally dead people are preserved at extremely low temperatures with the hope that they may one day be revived or treated with future technology.

“We have not registered any FIR yet and are studying the relevant laws,” a Kurar police officer said.