south

Updated: Jul 29, 2019 19:26 IST

The mortal remains of veteran Congress leader and former Union minister S Jaipal Reddy were cremated with full state honours at Necklace Road in Hyderabad on Monday evening.

Thousands of people, including Congress leaders and representatives of various other political parties, bid a tearful adieu to the departed leader. His elder son, Aravind Reddy, lit his funeral pyre amidst chanting of hymns by priests and slogans such as “Jaipal Reddy amar rahe” by his followers.

Senior leaders Mallikarjun Kharge and Ghulam Nabi Azad attended the funeral. Other leaders like Saleem Ahmed, RC Khuntia and CPM national general secretary Sitaram Yechury, among others paid homage to Reddy.

Former Karnataka chief minister Siddaramaiah and former Karnataka Speaker K R Ramesh Kumar, who flew down to Hyderabad immediately after the assembly session, participated in the funeral procession as pallbearers and carried Reddy’s body to the funeral pyre.

Earlier in the day, hundreds of people thronged Jaipal Reddy’s residence in Jubilee Hill to pay their last respects. His body was later taken to Gandhi Bhavan, the headquarters of the Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee at Nampally, for the party workers and leaders to pay their homage.

State minister Talasani Srinivas Yadav and former MP Gutha Sukhender Reddy oversaw the preparations for the funeral.

Telangana chief minister K Chandrashekar Rao, who had paid his last respects to the departed leader on Sunday, announced that the three-acre land adjacent to the Samadhi of former Prime Minister P V Narasimha Rao would be developed as Jaipal Reddy’s memorial.