'Aaj pehli baar laga…': Akhilesh's emotional tweet after father's cremation

The former Uttar Pradesh chief minister had died aged 82 at a private hospital in Gurugram on Monday.

Updated on: Oct 12, 2022, 13:51:52 IST

By HT News Desk | Edited by Kunal Gaurav

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Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav posted an emotional tweet a day after his father and former Uttar Pradesh chief minister Mulayam Singh Yadav was cremated with full state honours on Tuesday in his native village of Saifai. Sharing two photographs from the site where the socialist icon was cremated on Tuesday amid a sea of humanity, Akhilesh said for the time he felt as if the morning arrived without the sun.

Former UP chief minister Akhilesh Yadav after the cremation of his father and Samajwadi Party patriarch Mulayam Singh Yadav.

“Aaj pehli baar laga…bin suraj ke uga savera,” the Samajwadi Party leader said in a tweet in Hindi.

Mulayam Singh Yadav, a three-time CM and former defence minister, died at a Gurugram hospital on Monday after a short bout of illness. He was 82.

Top political leaders cutting across party lines arrived at Saifai in UP’s Etawah district on Tuesday to pay their last respects to ‘netaji’, as he was fondly called. Union defence minister Rajnath Singh, Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla, Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge, Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) chief Sharad Pawar were among the top leaders who were present at the funeral service.

Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot, Chhattisgarh CM Bhupesh Baghel, Telangana CM K Chandrashekar Rao, Samajwadi Party MP Jaya Bachchan and her son Abhishek Bachchan also attended the funeral. BJP leader Varun Gandhi was seen hugging Akhilesh Yadav.

Yadav lit the funeral pyre in the Safai’s mela ground as slogans like ‘Netaji amar rahe’ reverberated in the air.

“We had a very strong relationship. Mulayam Singh Yadav was a big personality in Indian politics, it is a huge loss for the country,” said Rajnath Singh, who laid a wreath on the mortal remains on behalf of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

“We all have come here to pay our tribute to him. Prime Minister Modi could not come here but he asked me to pay tribute on his behalf,” he added.

Uttar Pradesh deputy chief ministers Keshav Prasad Maurya and Brajesh Pathak were seen offering their condolences to Akhilesh during the funeral service.

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