India, Aug. 15 -- An excellent work of reportage, The Corpse Collector delves deep into the life of Vinu P, a man who has dedicated his life to retrieving unclaimed and decomposed bodies in Kerala.

Vinu, who offers the dead much-needed dignity, became a corpse collector quite accidentally, at the age of 15. A schoolmate had drowned in a river and he offered to help the police when everyone else looked away. He was wearing his school uniform when he pulled out his first body.

Initially, it was the congratulatory pat from the police that drew Vinu to retrieving badly mangled and crushed bodies from roadsides and railway tracks. He started assisting a bunch of corpse collectors. He tagged along with his mentors, who tipped him for running ...