Former finance minister Arun Jaitely cremated with State honours

Former finance minister Arun Jaitley was cremated at the Nigambodh Ghat here with full State honours on Sunday in the presence of leaders from across the political spectrum and scores of his admirers and party workers. Jaitley's son Rohan performed the last rites.

The 66-year-old BJP stalwart passed away at the AIIMS here on Saturday. Vice President Venkaiah Naidu, BJP veteran LK Advani, party president and Home Minister Amit Shah, Defence Minister Rajnath Singh, party's working president J P Nadda, Union ministers Nirmala Sitharaman, Smriti Irani and Anurag Thakur; BJP MPs Vijay Goel and Vinay Sahasrabuddhe; Congress leaders Jyotiraditya Scindia and Kapil Sibal were among those present at the cremation ground.

Chief ministers of Maharashtra, Gujarat, Karnataka, Bihar and Uttarakhand, Devendra Fadnavis, Vijay Rupani, B S Yediyurappa, Nitish Kumar and Trivendra Singh Rawat, respectively, were also there. Earlier in the day, his body was taken to the BJP headquarters from where it was carried in a flower-decked gun carriage to the cremation ground, amidst slogans of 'Jaitley ji amar rahein' (long live Jaitley).

BJP workers and mourners queued up in large numbers outside the party headquarters since morning to pay their last respects to the leader. Posters remembering Jaitley have been put up on the roads leading to the Nigambodh Ghat, on the banks of the Yamuna river.