Dhaka – Former Tamil Nadu chief minister J Jayalalithaa was laid to rest at MGR Memorial on the Marina Beach in Chennai on Tuesday evening with full state honours.
The body was taken from Rajaji Hall in Triplicane at around 4.30pm in a flower-decked cortege. Her mortal remains were flanked by her close aide Sasikalaa Natarajan and her family members on one side and her successor O Panneerselvam and other party leaders on the other, reports Times of India.
Around 10,000 police and army personnel guarded the procession as it moved towards Marina, a little less than two kilometres away, where she was laid to rest. Before her coffin was lowered into a freshly dug pit at around 6pm, several leaders, including Governor Vidyasagar Rao, Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Ghulam Nabi Azad, and Union ministers Venkaiah Naidu and Pon Radhakrishnan paid their tributes.
The funeral ceremony also had a few rituals according to Vaishnavite custom. As her coffin was lowered the Madras Regiment paid gun salute.
Earlier, President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi paid their last respects to Jayalalithaa at Rajaji Hall.
People started flocking to Rajaji Hall after her body was brought there around 5.30am from her Poes Garden residence. Jayalalithaa died on Monday night after suffering a cardiac arrest while undergoing treatment at Apollo Hospitals. From the hospital, her body was taken to her Poes Garden residence, and from there it was brought to Rajaji Hall.
The body, wrapped in the national flag, was kept in a semi-inclined position in Rajaji Hall, and there was long queue of mourners outside. The queue extended for almost a kilometer on the Anna Salai. AIADMK cadre were inconsolable, and wailing rented the air.
Shops, eateries and pharmacies in Chennai remained closed. City commute was badly hit, with autorickshaw and cabs off the road. Only a limited number of MTC buses plying.
Earlier, hundreds of thousands of people thronged the southern Indian city of Chennai on Tuesday to honor their late beloved leader, Jayaram Jayalalithaa, a former film actress and popular politician.
Jayalalithaa, chief minister of Tamil Nadu state, died overnight following a heart attack a day earlier.
A sea of weeping mourners surged toward the steps of a public hall where Jayalalithaa’s body, draped in the Indian flag, was kept on a raised platform.
Thousands of police officers formed chains to stop the heaving crowd from surging up the steps. Men and women wept, some breaking into loud wails. Several mourners fainted from the heat and dehydration. Police said some had been keeping vigil outside the Apollo Hospital since Sunday and then walked to Rajaji Hall at daybreak.
In New Delhi, lawmakers observed a minute’s silence Tuesday before both houses of Parliament were adjourned for the day in respect for the woman whom many referred to as “Amma,” or mother.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi said Jayalalithaa’s death left a “huge void in Indian politics.” He flew to Chennai, where he placed a wreath on the body.
Roads leading to Chennai were clogged as people from remote villages poured into Tamil Nadu’s capital to catch a last glimpse of their leader.
The Tamil Nadu government declared seven days of mourning for Jayalalithaa, who was a five-time chief minister of the state. Schools and offices were closed after authorities declared public holidays in the state for three days.
Within hours of Jayalalithaa’s death, her trusted lieutenant, O. Panneerselvam, was sworn in as chief minister.
Hundreds of political leaders and film celebrities were expected to attend Jayalalithaa’s funeral, scheduled for later Tuesday.
Jayalalithaa, 68, had been hospitalized since September, suffering from a fever, dehydration and a respiratory infection.
At the time, thousands of people prayed and fasted outside the hospital for her recovery. Doctors barred visitors, sparking rumors that they were withholding bad news out of fear it could trigger the same outpouring of grief, riots and suicides that followed the death of Jayalalithaa’s political and acting mentor, M.G. Ramachandran.
Jayalalithaa was 13 when she began her film career and quickly became known as a romantic lead in many of the nearly 150 Tamil-language movies she worked on.
She entered politics in the early 1980s, under the guidance of Ramachandran, and after his death in 1987 declared herself his political heir and took control of the All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhgam party.
She served as Tamil Nadu’s chief minister, the highest elected position in the state of 71 million people, for nearly 14 years beginning in 1991. She regained her office last year after a corruption case against her was overturned by a court.
Jayalalithaa endeared herself to the poor and powerless with her policy of giving out handouts — laptop computers and bicycles to students, spice grinders, free rice and subsidized food to the poor, cows and goats to farm women — enabling them to rise out of rural poverty. She pushed government officials and workers to promote health and education by presenting gold coins and awards to those who exceeded their goals.
Although she was criticized by many who equated her handouts with bribery, she said it was her scheme to wipe out rural poverty. In return, she was loved by the poor who saw her as their charismatic benefactor.
“She was their redeemer. Their savior,” Vasanthi, a well-known Tamil writer and Jayalalithaa’s biographer, wrote in the Indian Express newspaper.
