Police Deny Lapse in Manchanda Body Handling

GURUGRAM: Haryana Police on Friday denied allegations of procedural lapses raised by the family of 31-year-old realty executive Yuvraj Singh Manchanda, whose body was recovered from a Sector 70 drain and later cremated as unidentified before relatives were shown photographs for identification.

A senior officer said prescribed steps were followed in handling the body. According to the police account, a passerby alerted the control room on September 10, a forensic team examined the scene under Badshahpur police station, an unnatural death case was registered under Section 194 of the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita, and the unidentified-body proforma IIF-10 was completed during post-mortem with details uploaded on the Crime and Criminal Tracking Network and Systems within the mandated period.

Family questions and the police reply

The family has questioned the Zipnet timeline, saying the entry shows the body found on September 10, cremated on September 14 and details uploaded on September 16, two days after cremation. Police said officers checked Zipnet on September 10 but found no matching missing-person entry at that time, and that it was not practical to keep refreshing the system every few hours. An officer added that Zipnet is not treated as the principal pan-India database for unidentified bodies and that CCTNS was the prescribed channel used.

Separately, police said the autopsy report recorded drowning as the cause of death and that no bullet injuries were found on the body, rejecting claims that Manchanda had been shot. Officers said the remains were badly decomposed and appeared to have stayed in water for several days, which made handling difficult. Police also said they had not received formal communication from Delhi Police identifying Manchanda as a missing person before the cremation.

The family has alleged that clothes were disposed of and that ashes and belongings were not clearly handed over. Police disputed that account, saying ashes and belongings in their possession had been preserved, the family was informed, and DNA samples were kept. These are competing claims. They have not been adjudicated by a court.

Delhi Police are investigating the murder angle after arresting a former colleague and her partner in Uttarakhand. Gurugram officers said they know little about those suspects because the murder investigation sits with Delhi. For Badshahpur, the live dispute is whether unidentified-body protocols, CCTNS uploads and inter-state missing-person matching worked as they should between September 10 and 16.

Manchanda, a Sarita Vihar resident who worked with a realty firm in Sector 29, had been missing since September 6 after telling family he had a meeting in Gurugram. His sister lodged a missing complaint in Delhi on September 11. The gap between recovery, cremation and family notification is what has driven public anger. Police maintain the 72-hour wait before cremating an unidentified body was observed and that photographs were circulated through official channels.

Until courts or a formal inquiry settle the record, both the family’s lapse claims and the police denial should be read as allegations and official rebuttals, not as proven findings. The murder case and the body-handling controversy now run on parallel tracks across two police jurisdictions.