Letters Forensic anthropology education and training in India Vina Vaswani 1 and Mohammed Nasir Ahmed 2 Dear editor We read with interest the article The development and status of forensic anthropology in India: a review of the literature and future directions by Baryah et al. 1 in a recent edition of Medicine, Science and the Law. While we acknowledge that the authors have con- ducted a comprehensive review of the development of forensic anthropology, including its importance and its current status in India, we believe that there is a need for further updated and complete information, hence this letter. We found some gaps in their presentation of the facts. First, the authors state that ‘In India, however, no such skeletal collections are available for examina- tion and research purposes’. However, there are medi- cal colleges where known skeletal collections were/are available, such as Bhopal Medico-Legal Institute and Aurangabad Medical College. Although in-depth demographic profiles are not available for these skeletal remains, their origin and sex are well known. Under the heading Training and Application of Forensic Anthropological Knowledge, the authors state in the first paragraph that no trained forensic anthropology graduate is available. However, one of the authors (M.N.A.) is a qualified and trained forensic anthropologist who received his PhD under the guid- ance of Prof. Ruma Purkait. Further, in the second paragraph, the authors state ‘no college or university is offering a full-time course in forensic anthropology’. Yet, in 2009, we conducted a workshop in forensic anthropology to undertake a need-based analysis. The response was encouraging. The tragic air disaster 2 involving Boeing flight 737-800 happened in Mangalore on 22 May 2010. 2 In that disaster, 158 people on board lost their lives. 3 Many of the forensic medicine faculty from the medical colleges in and around Mangalore provided medico- legal services. The charring of the bodies made identi- fication challenging. One hundred and thirty-six bodies were identified based on visual recognition and person- al effects. 4 Only 22 bodies were subjected to DNA analysis in a last-ditch effort to identify them. Thirty-two samples from relatives were compared. This resulted in the identification of a further 10 bodies. The identity of 12 bodies could not be estab- lished, implying that some of the earlier bodies may have been misidentified or erroneously handed over. 5 This disaster allowed us to see that there were numerous gaps in service provision dealing with disas- ters at both international and national levels, as well as revealing the gaps in skills within forensic anthro- pology and Disaster Victim Identification (DVI). To address this, at Yenepoya University, we decided to make a small change by introducing forensic anthro- pology training. One of the authors (V.V.) underwent training in forensic anthropology and DVI at the Central Institute of Forensic Sciences Bangkok in 2014 and further training in mass casualty manage- ment, including air disaster simulation in Seoul, Korea, in 2014. In 2014, in consultation with Dr Luis Fondebrider, President, Equipo Argentino de Anthropologia Forense (EAAF), and Dr Ruma Purkait, Professor of Anthropology, Allahabad University, and the Department of Forensic Medicine, Yenepoya Medical College, Yenepoya designed a tailor-made, skill-based curriculum for the Postgraduate Diploma in Forensic Anthropology and Odontology (PGDFAO) for those involved with medico-legal investigations. The EAAF is a non-government organisation that is more than three decades old extensively engaged in identifying human remains worldwide. A memorandum of under- standing was signed between the Department of Forensic Medicine, Yenepoya, and EAAF Argentina. 1 Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology and Centre for Ethics, Yenepoya deemed to be University, India 2 Forensic Anthropology, Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology, Yenepoya deemed to be University, India Corresponding author: Vina Vaswani, Department of Forensic Medicine and Toxicology and Centre for Ethics, Yenepoya deemed to be University, Mangalore 575018, India. Email: vinavaswani@yenepoya.edu.in Medicine, Science and the Law 0(0) 1–2 ! The Author(s) 2019 Article reuse guidelines: sagepub.com/journals-permissions DOI: 10.1177/0025802419879003 journals.sagepub.com/home/msl