Sonipat, Aug. 6 -- In a quiet corner of an old-age home in Sonipat, Haryana, an elderly man was laid to rest this week. There was no crowd of grieving family, no daughters holding each other as the fire was lit, and no hands reaching out to touch his forehead one last time. Instead, three phones lit up in three different corners of India and Nepal. Through small glowing screens, his daughters watched their father leave the world.

His name was Shivcharan Ram Ratan Gupta. He was once a textile trader in Mumbai, a man who built a life, raised three daughters, and spent his final year and a half in a home meant for those with nowhere else to go. He came here after his wife, Meena, passed away, carrying a phone that was, for a long time, his ...