Nehru Cremated On River-Bank

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30453, 29 May 1964, Page 11

Nehru Cremated On River-Bank

(N.Z.P.A.-Reuter—Copyright) NEW DELHI, May 28. Hundreds of thousands of mourning Indians today packed the route to Jawaharlal Nehru’s funeral pyre on the banks of the sacred river Jumna. Mr Nehru, who died suddenly yesterday, was cremated in a simple Hindu ceremony near the spot where his beloved leader, Mahatma Gandhi, was committed to the flames after his assassination 16 years ago.

On a date yet to be fixed, Mr Nehru’s ashes will be consigned into the Ganges—the holy river of the Hindus—at a sacred spot at Allahabad, which was also his birthplace and home.

Crowds wept as the cortege passed through the great iron gates of his house, where, only an hour earlier, two persons had been killed in a stampede to catch a last glimpse of his body-

Mr Nehru’s 18-year-old grandson, Sanjay, thrust a torch into the pyre and the body of the man who was India’s Prime Minister from the time of independence in 1947, was engulfed in flames. It was 4.37 p.m. A volley was fired and a great cry went from the huge crowds as the flames, fanned by the wind, began to lick upwards and consume the pyre, on which the dead leader’s body was invisible under a pile of silk scarves and sandalwood. Army buglers sounded the Last Post and the crowds chanted “Nehru Zindabad.” (Long live Nehru.) Beside the mounting flames Sanjay stood looking forlorn and bewildered. The flames rose higher and higher as more and mare ghee (clarified butter) was poured on to the pyre. The platform on which the pyre stood had been completed only while the funeral procession, with Mr Nehru’s body on a gun carriage, was on its way to the river-bank from his home six miles away. Messages of condolence from all over the world continued to pour into New Delhi during the night.

Reactions to what President Ayub Khan of Pakistan called an “irreparable loss to India” ranged from the closing down of Government offices in Uganda to the suspension of the United Na-

tions Security Council debate.

All-India Radio said today that the immediate cause of Mr Nehru’s death was a haemorrhage of the aorta —the main artery leading from the heart.

Mr Nehru began suffering pain at 3 a.m. yesterday, but did not call anyone. About 5 a.m. he got up and shaved but before he could take his bath he collapsed. Doctors were summoned immediately but he became unconscious and did not regain consciousness or speak again.

Throughout the night, thousands of his grieving followers flocked past the body as it lay in state at his

home, to pay their last respects to the father of modern India. As they approached, many shouted: “Nehru amar rahen!” (may Nehru remain immortal).

Dim overhead lights shone on tear-stained faces as the unending procession passed by. By midnight it was estimated that half a million people had filed past. The body, with the face uncovered, was draped in the saffron, white and green national colours. The house where Mr Nehru lay was heavy with the scent of flowers as foreign mourners, one after another, laid wreaths.

Sir Alec Douglas-Home placed a wreath on Mr Nehru’s body at the lying-in-State.

Then he spoke words of sorrow and comfort to Mrs Indira Gandhi, who was standing at the side of her father’s body with tears in her eyes. Lord Mountbatten laid a huge wreath of red and white roses on the body on behalf of Queen Elizabeth and the Duke of Edinburgh.

A gun carriage drawn by men of the armed forces and bearing the body of Mr Nehru-, left his home on a six-mile journey through New Delhi to the funeral pyre.

The body of Mr Nehru, looking serene and at peace, lay with his head resting on a white pillow. His body, draped in the national flag, rested in a great mound of flowers and wreaths. In the cars of official mourners were Mrs Ghandi, dressed in the white robes of Hinda mourning, with her younger son, Sanjay; Sir Alec Douglas-Home, Lord Mountbatten, Pakistan’s Foreign Minister, Mr Z. A. Bhutto, and the Soviet Vice-Premier, Mr Alexei Kosygin. Crowds estimated at nearly three million lined the route as the cortege moved slowly down broad avenues and past Parliament House, the scene of the announcement of India’s freedom in 1947, and where Mr Nehru had so often held the House spellbound by his oratory. The flower - bedecked gun carriage was greeted with cries of anguish from weeping and sobbing crowds. Many people had climbed trees overlooking the route. Saplings were bent to the ground by the weight of people, and branches broke from trees as spectators crowded to catch a glimpse of the dead leader. Mr Nehru’s 18-year-old grandson, Sanjiv Gandhi, arrived after driving all night from Kashmir, and stopped to kiss his grandfather’s forehead. To him fell the task, in the absence of his elder brother in England, of putting the torch to the sandalwood funeral pyre.