Last rites of Kalam to be held in his native place: Collector

Tens of thousands of people gathered in the southern Indian town of Rameswaram on Thursday for the burial of former President A.P.J.

The funeral of the “Missile Man” was attended by a galaxy of leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi who placed a wreath, offered his final salute and stood in silence in front of Kalam’s body that was draped in national flag.

According to the Collector, the body would be brought from Delhi to Madurai airport by a special aircraft and will be taken to Mandapam helipad in a chopper.

Union Parliamentary Affairs Minister M. Venkaiah Naidu and Defence Minister Manohar Parrikar are already here.

It is a solace that he expired while doing the things he liked best, igniting the minds of the youth of Country, said the Chief Minister.

These were the words of former President A P J Abdul Kalam which he lived by till the last moment.

Dr. Kalam agreed readily to my BookBox proposal, maybe because it was for children but possibly also because I had approached him through his co-author for “Wings of Fire”, Dr. Arun Tiwari.

Dr Kalam’s body was taken to Rameswaram on Wednesday and hundreds of people have poured into the town to pay their last respects. After 8pm, the mortal remains would be handed over to the family members. His father owned a boat, and his mother constantly struggled to keep the family sufficiently fed and clothed.

She wrote his name as “ABJ Kalam Azad“. 600 when he determined to depart Rameswaram to be a part of the Madras Institute of Technology.

Apart from leading a simple life throughout even while thinking very high, Dr. Kalam was honest statesman and kept the genuine interest of nation above all other considerations.

Many locals have been unable to consider he was no extra. “It is sad that this gift has left us”, Rameshwaram resident A. Johnson told IANS.

At one point, I voiced one of my rare objections to something he had written, which seemed a bit too much of a broadbrush statement to me. “This was definitely a surprise to me and the Rashtrapati Bhavan secretariat had to rework the letter appointing Dr Manmohan Singh as the Prime Minister and inviting him to form the government at the earliest”, Kalam had written in the book.