dehradun the 75yearold gardener who worked for uttarakhand tourism minister satpal maharaj and had tested positive for covid19 on may 31 along with the minister and his contacts died on tuesday he was discharged from the hospital six days ago in keeping with the latest protocol of indian council of medical research icmr the elderly man had no kin and his body lay unattended for over 12 hours as policemen were apprehensive about coming in contact with it fearing coronavirus transmission the health department on the other hand has maintained there is no need for a postmortem to ascertain the cause of death as the deceased didnt have any influenzalike symptoms the gardener was discharged 10 days after being admitted to the hospital without testing negative for the virus even as the tourism minister and his wife stayed in the hospital for 16 days sources at the all india institute of medical sciences aiims rishikesh confirmed that both the minister and his wife had been tested before being dischargedpolice said local residents had informed them about the gardeners death early on tuesday his last rites were not performed till the filing of this report he was found dead around 5am the policemen refused to touch him even as the health department maintained there was no need for a coronavirus test or a postmortem said an eyewitnesshe must have collapsed and died it may have been due to a myocardial infarction heart attack there have been 343092 cases of covid19 in india so far if any of them dies after being discharged there is no need for a test or an autopsy said chief medical officer cmo bc ramolaaccording to dr ns khatri nodal officer of covid19 at government doon medical college the deceased was admitted in doon hospital on may 31 and was moved to a covid care centre ccc on june 5 he was discharged from the ccc on june 10 and had been in home isolation since he addedwhile satpal maharaj couldnt be contacted after repeated attempts his personal secretary satendra sajwan told toi that the administration had informed the minister about the cremation and maharaj had offered all possible help