Prayer meeting to mourn death of Nitish's wife

Patna, May 27(UNI) Politicians of all hues today congregated at the official residence of Bihar Chief Minister Nitish Kumar to join an all religion prayer meeting held to pray for eternal peace of the departed soul of Mr Kumar's spouse who passed away on May 14.

Not only political personalities, the list of mourners who attended today's function to mark the conclusion of mourning period, included among others Governor R S Gavai, Chief Justice of Patna High Court J N Bhatt and Speaker and Chairman of Lower and Upper Houses of Bihar Legislature Uday Narayan Choudhury and Arun Kumar respectively.

Railway Minister and RJD Chief Lalu Prasad, Union Steel and Fertiliser Minister and LJP chief Ram Vilas Paswan,Union Minister Jai Prakash Yadav, national president and general secretary of BJP Rajnath Singh and Arun Jaitley respectively, former Bihar Chief Ministers Rabri Devi and Dr Jagannath Mishra, JD(U) president Sharad Yadav, former Union Health Minister Dr C P Thakur, beleagured JD(U) leader and former Union Minister George Fernandes, former deputy Chairperson of Rajya Sabha Najma Hepatullah all assembled under the same roof to join a bereaved Nitish Kumar in praying for eternal peace of his departed wife's soul.

Clergies drawn from all religions recited select hymns from various scriptures befitting the occasion which lasted for more than two hours.

Hazrat Maulana Shamim of Khanqah of Mittal Ghat, Patna city, Bramchari Ravindra Jain of Kundalpur, Arch Bishop of Patna and Buxar, and Dr Sundra Nand of Boddh religion, Arbind Shastri, Manoj Shastri and Ved Prakash--represented different religions in the prayer meeting.

Earlier in a release issued here, Chief Minister Nitish Kumar expressed his gratitude to all those who stood by him in braving the trauma in his life following the demise of his wife.

UNI