Sangh Parivar pays last respects to Nanaji

The entire BJP leadership and the larger Sangh Parivar turned up to pay their last respects to Nanaji Deshmukh, before his body was donated to AIIMS for medical research, on Sunday. The RSS veteran, who created an “alternative model of development based on Deendayal Upadhyay’s ideals of Integral Humanism” while working in some 500 villages around Chitrakoot (on Uttar Pradesh-Madhya Pradesh border), wanted his body to be donated for medical research after his death.

Founder of the nation’s first rural university, the Chitarkoot Gramodya Vishwavidyalaya, Nanaji, a Padma Vibhushan awardee, had pledged his body for medical research. Suffering from age-related ailments, he had refused to be taken to Delhi for treatment.

The body was kept at the RSS headquarters in the capital before it was handed over to AIIMS. A wreath was laid on the body on behalf of President Pratibha Patil.

He had held various high posts in the RSS at the national and state level and his lectures on the RSS ideology and nationalism are considered memorable.

Advani described Deshmukh as a dedicated worker who made an unparalled contribution in the formation of Bharatiya Jan Sangh.

"It is more than a personal loss for me. We had been together for so many years....When there is so much attraction towards posts, he gave inspiration for idealism," Advani said.

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