A dentist from Sharjah died suddenly at home on Monday morning, with her family now navigating the repatriation process back to India. Dr Afina Basheer, a Kerala native who had been living in Sharjah for four years, collapsed and died with no prior signs of illness, according to her husband Yasser.
The death comes two years after Afina’s brother, also a doctor, was killed in an accident in India. He was her only brother and the loss, Raheem, a relative of Yasser, said, had left the wider family still recovering when this second tragedy struck.
Afina and Yasser have two daughters, aged 3.5 and 1.5. Afina had taken a break from practising dentistry to care for them. The family had returned from a summer vacation in India on 19 August.
What the family faces with the Sharjah dentist sudden death repatriation
Because the death was sudden and unexpected, it is classified as an unnatural death under UAE procedures. The UAE government requires three documents before a death certificate can be issued in such cases: a medical report from a forensic doctor, a no-objection certificate from the relevant police station, and a letter from the Public Prosecution.
Raheem said the family was hoping to complete the paperwork by Thursday so the burial in India could proceed over the weekend. ‘There is a lot of paperwork to complete,’ he said. ‘We have to get the forensic report and death certificate before we can repatriate her body.’
The UK Government’s guidance on deaths in the UAE notes that in Sharjah, death certificates for repatriation can be obtained from the Department of Preventative Medicine, Kuwait Hospital, or Al Qassimi Hospital, depending on circumstances.
The Indian Ministry of External Affairs states that repatriation from Gulf countries normally takes two to four weeks due to local procedures, and that unnatural death cases can take considerably longer if investigations into the cause of death are still ongoing. The family’s hope of completing the process within days would place them significantly ahead of that typical window.
The Consulate General of India in Dubai publishes detailed procedures for those taking responsibility for the repatriation, burial, or cremation of a deceased Indian national in the UAE.
Children left asking for their mother
Raheem said the family was struggling to explain Afina’s absence to her two young daughters. ‘The children keep asking for her and we told them that she is in the hospital,’ he said. ‘They are sometimes stubborn and start crying. We don’t know how to tell them anything. They are so small. We are not even sure if they will understand. Right now, we are all rallying around and taking turns caring for them.’
Yasser described his wife as ‘perfectly healthy’ and said she had shown no signs of illness before she collapsed.
Sudden collapses among otherwise healthy residents are not unprecedented in the UAE. Gulf News reported a 17-year-old Indian student at Sharjah Indian School died of sudden cardiac arrest in December. Earlier this year, two Indian expatriates also died suddenly while playing sport in Dubai.
The forensic report, which the family is waiting on, will determine the official cause of death and set the timeline for when the body can be released for repatriation to India.
