Following rich floral tributes paid to Union Rural Minister Gopinath Munde at the Bharatiya Janta Party (BJP) office, his body is now being taken on a gun carriage to the airport from where, it will be flown by special aircraft to his home district of Beed for last rites.
Earlier, several top leaders, including L.K.Advani, Arun Jaitley, Sharad Pawar, M. Venkaiah Naidu, M. M. Joshi, Sushma Swaraj, Nitin Gadkari, Rajnath Singh, Smriti Irani, Ananth Kumar, Ravi Shankar Prasad, Vijay Goel and several party workers offered their last respects to the departed leader.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Vice President Hamid Ansari, also offered their homage.
Leaders cutting across party lines were also seen at the 11 Ashoka Road where his mortal remains were kept. Union Consumer Affairs Minister LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan, Congress vice-president Rahul Gandhi accompanied by Uttarakhand chief minister Harish Rawa, Janata Dal-United (JD-U) president Sharad Yadav all were seen offering their homage to the departed soul.
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Munde was travelling towards the airport, when his SUV was hit by a Tata Indica car roundabout at the Tughlak Road around 6.20 a.m. Munde, who was sitting on the front passenger seat took the major impact of the hit, and was rushed to the AIIMS Trauma Centre for emergency treatment. The medical staff at the centre declared him dead at 7:20 a.m., according to statement read out by AIIMS personnel.
The Marathwada leader's funeral is scheduled for tomorrow in Beed district at around 4.30 p.m.
