Centre respects Kalam’s wish; no holidays in Central government offices
President Pranab Mukherjee and Prime Minister Narendra Modi after paying their last respects to former president A.P.J. Abdul Kalam at Air Force Station Palam in New Delhi on Tuesday. (Photo: PTI)
New Delhi: The nation paid its last respects to the late A.P.J. Abdul Kalam on Tuesday as President Pranab Mukherjee, Prime Minister Narendra Modi and leaders across the political divide paid homage to the “People’s President”.
Students and citizens from all walks of life could be seen flocking to 10 Rajaji Marg, Kalam’s official post-retirement residence in Lutyen’s Delhi, waiting for their turn for a last look at the mortal remains of the man who had asked them to “dream big”.
A seven-day period of national mourning is being observed in honour of Kalam, whose last rites will be at his birthplace in Tamil Nadu’s Rameswaram on Thursday morning in line with the wishes of his family, headed by his older brother Muthu Mohammed Meeran Marraikar, 99. Dr Kalam will be given a state funeral with full military honours. No holiday was, however, declared in Central government offices.
President Mukherjee, vice-president Hamid Ansari, Prime Minister Modi and defence minister Manohar Parrikar, along with the three service chiefs and Delhi’s Lieutenant-Governor and Chief Minister, were among the host of dignitaries who received Kalam’s mortal remains at the Palam Air Force Station as his body was flown there from Shillong, where the former President died late on Monday evening., via Guwahati in a special military aircraft.
The dignitaries placed wreaths on the body wrapped in the tricolour and placed on a deck on the tarmac. The President and the other dignitaries stood in silence as a tri-services guard of honour saluted their former supreme commander, before the former president’s body was taken in a flower-bedecked gun carriage to 10 Rajaji Marg.
Kalam’s last words for a cop:
Former president late A.P.J. Abdul Kalam had congratulated a constable for remaining alert throughout the day, minutes before he collapsed at the Indian Institute of Management and died on Monday night.
“The former president congratulated an SOT (special operation team) personnel for being alert throughout the road trip from Guwahati to Shillong last evening,” East Khasi Hills district SP M. Kharkrang said.
“I want to meet him and thank him,” Kalam had said to his aide Srijan Pal Singh about a cop who was standing all along Kalam’s two-and-half-hour journey on Monday. “Later, Kalam thanked him and said, Are you tired? Would you like something to eat? I am sorry you had to stand so long because of me,” said Mr Singh. The personnel at first got scared after Kalam summoned him. But then he acknowledged the constable for doing his duty properly, said Mr Kharkrang.
( Source : deccan chronicle )
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