Thousands bid farewell to Karthikeyan

Thousands of people turned up at various places on Sunday to bid goodbye to Kerala speaker G. Karthikeyan, who passed away on Saturday after battling liver cancer for the past few months.

His body was brought to his official residence here on Saturday from Bengaluru where he died.

The compound of his official residence which is next door to the Kerala Legislative assembly was thrown open to all and till Sunday morning, thousands of people from all walks of life came to pay their last respects.

On Sunday morning, the body was placed at the members' lounge in the assembly as 66-year-old Karthikeyan became the first speaker of the assembly to die while the session is on.

The budget session of the 13th assembly began on Friday with the Governor's address and the state budget for the 2015-16 fiscal will be presented on March 13th.

Leader of opposition V.S. Achuthanandan, political leaders from various parties and the staff of the legislature paid their last respects and from there, the body was moved to the Congress party headquarters.

From there, it was taken to the Durbar Hall in the state Secretariat, the seat of power.

At the Durbar Hall, Kerala Governor P. Sathasivam paid homage to Karthikeyan.

From there, his body was taken to his assembly constituency in the city suburbs near Aruvikara for his electorate to pay their last respects.

Then it was brought back to his home in the city and all the religious rites was conducted and the body was taken for its final journey to the state-owned crematorium.

Near the crematorium, he was accorded the official send off and after that the body was placed inside the crematorium and was consigned to flames.

Present at the crematorium were Kerala Chief Minister Oommen Chandy and his cabinet colleagues. Also present were Congress leaders A.K. Antony, M. Veerapa Moily, Mukul Wasnik, Left leader V.S. Achuthanandan and numerous top political leaders.

On Monday, the assembly will wind up the day's proceedings after the obituary reference and then the business advisory committee will meet to discuss if any change is needed in the present schedule.

On Monday at 10.30 a.m, an all-party meeting will be held at the VJT Hall here in Karthikeyan's honour and all leading politicians from various parties will be present on the occasion.

A seven-day mourning that began on Saturday has already been declared in the state as a mark of respect to him.