Managing a cemetery is good business, at least in Lucknow. Creating scarcity or the fear of no place to bury ones dead is forcing people reserve plots. Now the interesting part is what record is kept of the reservation, besides the plot being marked. There's always a tussle for control of the burial board with the new incumbents left with little or no money to function...
Why can't they do this same job in a better manner. Many years ago I visited a 19th Century cemetery located within the Varanasi Cantonment. and found that there were many graves that had succumbed to the vagaries of time, not vandals or the heavy hand of the burial board and the name plaques had been preserved in the boundary wall. Not so here! It can be done here if someone responsible offers some advice. The graves disappearing disturbs the minority Anglo-Indian community more than anyone else. By minority I mean as opposed to the Indian Christian community because many of them are fresh converts who don't have ancestors buried here. What compounds the problem is the fact that it is this section of Christians who control the burial board. A Catholic priest might also be included but usually stays away from the daily running of the cemeteries.
