BENGALURU: Veteran Congress leader and former Union minister C K Jaffer Sharief was laid to rest with full state honours on Monday afternoon. Senior leaders of the Congress including Ghulam Nabi Azad, Mallikarjun Kharge, Sushil Kumar Shinde, K C Venugopal paid their last respects to the mortal remains while ministers U T Khader, Zameer Ahmed Khan and Congress legislators Rizwan Arshad, M B Patil and N A Haris and KPCC chief Dinesh Gundu Rao also took part in the 85-year-old senior leader’s final procession.
Sharief, who breathed his last at a private hospital in Bengaluru on Sunday, was laid to rest after community prayers at Khuddus Saheb Burial Ground.
Chief Minister H D Kumaraswamy also offered his tribute to Jaffer Sharief after the mortal remains were brought to the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee office on Queen’s Road for cadres to pay their respects.
Sharief’s mortal remains were taken in a procession to the burial ground where afternoon prayers by the community were offered before he was finally laid to rest with state honours.
“I have known him for 50 years. He had invited me to a book release programme when we met the last time. Never had I imagined that I would see him like this,” said Congress leader in the Lok Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge expressing his sorrow at the loss of a party colleague and friend.