Pranab Mukherjee cremated with full state honours
Tributes continued to pour in for the statesman, scholar and master political strategist, who stayed in public life for more than five decades as a long-time Congress leader and then as president, but only close family and friends were present at the funeral conducted with full state honours
Former Indian president Pranab Mukherjee was cremated on Tuesday at a crematorium in New Delhi's Lodhi Road.
India bid farewell to "Citizen Mukherjee", who was given a ceremonial send-off in accordance with Covid-19 protocol, with visors, face shields, masks and the number of people strictly restricted, reports the PTI.
Tributes continued to pour in for the statesman, scholar and master political strategist, who stayed in public life for more than five decades as a long-time Congress leader and then as president, but only close family and friends were present at the funeral conducted with full state honours.
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Pranab Mukherjee, 84, died on Monday at the Army''s Research and Referral Hospital following a 21-day battle with multiple ailments.
He tested positive for Covid-19 when he was admitted to the hospital on August 10 and was operated the same day for removal of a brain clot.
His son, former MP Abhijit Mukherjee, performed the last rites with family and friends paying their last respects clad in personal protective gear.
Mukherjee was the president of India from 2012 to 2017. A quintessential Congressman, the seven-time parliamentarian had worked as a teacher and journalist before taking his first steps in politics.
His first stop in Delhi was the Rajya Sabha in 1969, the House that re-elected him four more times before he won his first Lok Sabha election from Bengal's Jangipur in 2004. He was re-elected in 2009.
The former Indian president was born in 1935 in Mirati, in South Bengal's Birbhum district.
