Thousands line streets for funeral of late Indian leader

NEW DELHI: Thousands of mourners in white funereal dress escorted the coffin of three-time prime minister Atal Bihari Vajpayee through the Indian capital on Friday, showering his body in rose petals before his cremation. Vajpayee, a poet and spellbinding orator respected across the political divide in India, died Thursday after a long period of declining health. He was 93. Prime Minister Narendra Modi, who described Vajpayee’s passing as “a personal and irreplaceable loss”, lead the procession through Delhi to the leafy cremation grounds near the sacred Yamuna River. Senior cadres from Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), the ruling party that Vajpayee nurtured into power, mourned alongside foreign dignitaries including Bhutan’s king and Afghanistan’s former leader Hamid Karzai. He was placed on a sandalwood pyre set alight by his foster daughter, as family poured sacred grains on the burning logs and incantations were recited by Hindu priests.