Jaipur, April 9 -- Days after six children died due to an unknown illness in Salumber district, the sarpanch of Ghata village on Wednesday alleged that the government did not perform an autopsy of the deceased while the block chief health and medical officer (BCMO) refuted the claims, stating that the parents refused to a post-mortem examination. Till Wednesday, at least 74 children from Udaipur and Salumber had been hospitalised after health officials found they exhibited symptoms similar to those of the six who died. Since April 1, six children-all aged 2 to 10 from Salumber's Ghata and Lalpura villages - died due to the unknown illness, officials said. The sarpanch of the Ghata gram panchayat, Nand Lal, said, "The government released the bodies of the victims without performing the autopsy, which was crucial to trace the disease to prevent it from spreading. The families have now also cremated the bodies," BCMO Dr Sintu Kumawat, said, "We tried to convince the families but they objected to an autopsy on their children. Several of them also brought their children back home against doctors' medical advice. Later, they also cremated the bodies." Two teams of health officials from Udaipur and Jaipur arrived in Salumber on Tuesday. They collected blood, stool and saliva samples from children (up to 15 years old) in 561 households under Ghata gram panchayat. The teams identified 74 children with similar symptoms, referring them immediately to the local community health centre and RNT Hospital in Udaipur for treatment. "We are trying to intensify the survey and analysing the samples thoroughly to trace the disease as soon as possible," Dr Kumawat added. He confirmed that the teams screened children from schools and anganwadis on Wednesday, taking samples from over 1,000. Manuram Meena, father of 4-year-old Deepak Meena, who died on April 1, said. "It happened only at span of an hour that my son fell sick. We immediately rushed him to the hospital but doctor declared him dead," said He said Deepak suddenly developed a fever after tea in the morning. "Soon, he started vomiting and also reported trouble in breathing. We immediately rushed him to the local primary health centre where he was declared dead. They could not specify the exact disease yet," Manuram said. Seema, 4, and an unidentified 1-year-old girl from Simor village died on April 1, followed by three others-Laxman Meena (4), Kajal Meena (2) and Rahul Meena (4)-on Monday, within one or two hours of showing similar symptoms. Jagadish Meena, whose son Subhash Meena (5) was admitted to RNT Medical College in Udaipur on Tuesday after fever and vomiting, said, "He had chana daal and roti at around 10 pm on Monday. Soon he fell sick, we got scared and called the doctor who rushed him to the local CHC from where he was referred to RNT on Tuesday. He is being given saline water. Doctors have also collected his blood samples. He is stable. But the doctors want to keep him under observation." Alaram Meena, father of 10-year-old Laxmi, said she fell sick while playing outside their house on Tuesday morning. "She didn't even eat or drink anything then. She was absolutely fine. We have no idea what happened to her." A discharge note from RNT stated: "Patient's relatives are insisting on DAMA [discharge against medical advice] inspite of the fact that the patient needed to be under observation and specific treatments."...