Hyderabad: After a long wait for an increase in the population of vultures, the Parsi community has slowly moved on to solar concentrators.
As per Zoroastrian tradition, the Parsi community follows the ‘Sky Burial’ system, i.e. leaving the dead body on structures called ‘Tower of Silence.’
When the vulture population used to be high, the birds used to consume the body fast. But, with the birds gone from most places, the practice is on the brink of extinction.
Hyderabad has around 1,200 Parsis and the community has two towers in the city. “There are around 20 deaths every year and the two towers are enough. Now, solar concentrators are fitted on the ‘Towers of Silence’ in a way that the light and heat is concentrated to speed up the decomposition of the body. The alternative was well thought out so that the ancient practice of Sky Burial is continued,” said O.M. Debara, a community elder.
