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HT Archives: Kashmir bids last goodbye to one of its tallest leaders
A record crowd honored Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah at his funeral in Srinagar, with over a million paying tribute at the Hazratbal shrine.
A record crowd -- never witnessed before in the living history of Kashmir -- turned out today in this capital city to pay tribute to the greatest son of Kashmir, Sheikh Mohammed Abdullah, whose body was laid to rest at Assar-e-Sharief Hazratbal at 6.40pm.
The resting place, which is in the shadow of the famous Hazratbal shrine, had been the scene of the Sheikh’s political activity as well as his place of worship. On his other side is the famous Dal Lake. It is in this shrine that Sheikh used to pray on Fridays; it is here that he made important political announcements.
It was from the pulpit of this shrine that he had nominated his son, Dr Farooq Abdullah, now the acting chief minister, as his successor.
His last public appearance was also at the shrine, about two weeks ago on a Friday.
The funeral procession reached the shrine at 5.30 pm and a special Namaz-i-Jinaza was offered. It took more than 10 hours to cover the 12km route. Prime Minister Indira Gandhi came to the burial site in a Shikara. She was accompanied by Dhirendra Brahmachari and former Jammu & Kashmir governor LK Jha was also present.
The gun carriage reached the burial site at 6.20pm and the coffin was lowered into the grave at 6.40pm. Many people fainted on the site and police cordon was broken by an impatient crowd. At the time of burial, arms were reversed and volleys fired in air and the last post sounded.
The streets of Srinagar awoke early to the cries of mourners. Huge throngs had taken a vantage points for a last glimpse of the beloved leader. The 12km route was packed with people sitting on rooftops, trees and electric poles long before the procession had started from Polo Ground where his body had lain in state for 24 hours.
Lt General SP Malhotra, army commander, Northern Command, led the procession and the muffled drums played the funeral march. The body of the Sheikh was buried under tonnes of flowers showered on it all along the route.
The body atop the gun carriage was wrapped in the tricolour and the State’s red flag. The escorts were senior army officials and his son, Farooq Abdullah.
Accompanying the procession were large number of dignitaries including Union home minister PC Sethi, law minister Jagan Nath Kaushal, Lok Sabha Speaker Balram Jakhar, governors and chief ministers including the governor of Jammu & Kashmir BK Nehru, large number of members of Parliament, Opposition leaders including Chandra Shekhar of Janata Party, Atal Bihari Vajpayee of Bharatiya Janata Party, HN Bahuguna, Chanderjeet Yadav, foreign diplomats, and large number of his friends and associates.
Prime Minister Indira Gandhi also joined the funeral procession when it started in the morning at 8am and went with it up to the Dal Gate. She reached the Hazratbal shrine by a different route.
A large waiting crowd formed the vanguard of the procession. The shouts of Sat Sri Akal and Har Har Mahadev joined the cries of Allah-o-Akbar. There were repeated shouts calling for unity of religions -- one of Sheikh’s deepest commitments.
Roughly, more than a million people offered their tributes to the veteran leader by either joining the funeral procession or the Namaz-i-Jinaza at Hazratbal or lining up the route: Srinagar city has a population of six lakh. People from all parts of the valley, Jammu and Ladakh had come walking or by bus, to join the procession.
The Kashmir station of all India Radio gave a running commentary on the progress of the procession while the television centre gave live coverage from Hasembagh, the burial site. The place of burial has been named Sher-i-Kashmir Park. This site was selected by the Sheikh as his final resting place, as he was very fond of the view.
