For millennia, Parsi communities have disposed of their dead in structures called dakhmas, or "towers of silence". These circular edifices are designed to prevent the soil, and the sacred elements of earth, fire and water, from being contaminated by corpses. Bodies are placed on top of the towers where they decompose, while vultures and other scavengers eat the flesh on the bones.
After being bleached by the sun and wind for up to a year, the bones are then collected in an ossuary pit at the centre of the tower. Lime aids in their gradual disintegration, and the remaining material, along with rainwater runoff, filters through coal and sand before it is washed out to sea.
"We are no longer able to fulfil our traditions," said Hoshang Kapadia, a Karachi resident in his 80s. "We've lost a way of life, our culture."
Kapadia said the Parsi burial customs mean "we take less and give more" to the world. "The whole idea is not to pollute the earth," he said.
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