'Dead' man rushed back to the hospital after coughing at his own funeral

A man who was thought to have died in a car crash shocked his grieving family after coughing at his own funeral.

South China Morning Post reported that the 19-year-old named Bhau Lachke from India was declared brain-dead by doctors after being left with several major injuries from a road accident.

His family said they were told he had "almost no chance of survival," so they went ahead and prepare for his funeral.

But at the start of his funeral, the man started moving and coughing, surprising everyone at the venue—from his loved ones to onlookers.

He was brought back to the hospital for further treatment.

"We thought we had lost him, but this feels like a miracle. We just want him to get better," his relative Gangaram Shinde is quoted as saying.

The man is still in critical condition on life support.

According to the SCMP, his family accused his doctors of misdiagnosing him and "misleading" them by telling them he was in "brain-dead" condition. For the hospital's part, they maintained that the patient's family may have only misunderstood what it meant.

"The patient was in a critical state, and we communicated his condition to the family. There was no declaration of death," a spokesperson for the hospital said.

An investigation into the matter is ongoing.