A video clip showing a social worker hugging the body of a COVID victim lying on a stretcher went viral on social media on Sunday.
The video showed the town-based social worker Annam Srinivas Rao kissing the forehead of the victim’s body and hugging it while carrying it on a stretcher in front of an ambulance.
According to sources, this happened two days ago near a private hospital in Khammam. The 40-year-old man, who succumbed to COVID-19, hailed from Madhira mandal.
Mr Rao was responding to a request reportedly made by the bereaved family to help them perform his final rites as per COVID-19 protocols, sources close to him said. Mr Rao claims to have conducted the last rites of nearly 200 COVID victims in the old undivided Khammam district and several adjoining districts besides in the border mandals of neighbouring Andhra Pradesh so far.
He himself battled COVID during the first wave of the pandemic last year.
Mr Rao runs a shelter home under the aegis of the Annam Seva Foundation in Khammam. He was selected for Global Peace Prize-2021 instituted by Indore-based World Book of Star Records in recognition of his distinguished services to destitute and mentally-challenged persons
