Vajpayee's ashes handed over to BJP state heads for immersion in 100 rivers

Prime Minister Narendra Modi and senior BJP leaders handed urns with former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's ashes to party presidents from across the country at a function in New Delhi on Wednesday.

Party chief Amit Shah, Home Minister Rajnath Singh and External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj. as well as members of Vajpayee's family, were present at the event held in the BJP headquarters here.

The BJP has decided to take out 'asthi kalash yatras' in all districts and immerse the ashes in rivers across the country.

The yatra was being organised as party workers and people in the country wanted to pay tribute to the late prime minister, who died last week after prolonged illness at the age of 93, party leaders said.

Defeated by Vajpayee in 2004, SP leader remembers the dignified contest

At the height of the 'India Shining' campaign by the then ruling National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government at the Centre and in the run-up to the 2004 Lok Sabha election, incumbent Prime Minister and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) mascot Atal Bihari Vajpayee was vying for his fifth straight parliamentary victory from Lucknow.

Pitted against him was Samajwadi Party (SP) candidate and an established city-based gynaecologist Dr Madhu Gupta. Gupta had in the past contested the 2000 Lucknow mayoral election, which was later won by BJP nominee Dr S C Rai, a veteran medical practitioner himself.

As was expected, Vajpayee went on to score a massive win over Gupta by a victory margin of over 218,000 votes, polling over 55 per cent votes vis-à-vis 18 per cent by the SP candidate. While he polled 324,714 votes, Gupta garnered 106,339.

In 2004, Lucknow had witnessed a low polling of 35 per cent, with roughly 587,000 voters out of an electorate of 1.6 million deciding to exercise their franchise.

Atal Bihari Vajpayee cremated, daughter Namita lights funeral pyre

Bugles sounded the last post, uniformed soldiers clicked their heels and a sombre silence fell over the crowd as former prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee's mortal remains were consigned to the flames on Friday evening, the sun setting on the life of a poet-politician who combined accommodative politics with graciousness.

Foster daughter Namita Kaul Bhattacharya lit the pyre as cries of "Atal Bihari Amar Rahe" reverberated.

India's top leadership, foreign dignitaries and the common man mourned Vajpayee's death and bid an emotional farewell to the former prime minister who was one of the most-loved leaders in decades and had acceptability across a diverse ideological spectrum.
Chief ministers, opposition leaders, chiefs of Army, Navy and Air Force, governors and a host of other dignitaries attended the funeral of Vajpayee at Rastriya Smriti Sthal, a picturesque cremation site at the heart of the capital.