Ex-RSS chief Sudarshan cremated in Nagpur

Nagpur : The last rites of former RSS chief K.S. Sudarshan were performed here Sunday.

Sudarshan died Saturday in Raipur after suffering cardiac arrest.

The ex-RSS chief’s brother K. Ramesh performed the last rites at Gangabai ghat in the eastern part of the city.

The body was kept at the prayer hall in Dr Hedgewar Smruti Mandir Parisar in Reshimbag for last tributes after it was brought here from Raipur by a special flight Saturday evening.

Top RSS and BJP leaders, including L.K. Advani, RSS chief Mohan Bhagwat, Gujarat Chief Minister Narendra Modi, Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chauhan and Karnataka Chief Minister Jagdish Shettar, attended the cremation.

“He was a nationalist thinker. He was committed to the promotion of Hindi. He had devoted all his life to the cause of the nation,” Chauhan said.

Sudharshan, 81, the first RSS chief from southern India, is survived by a brother and a sister. He was a bachelor.

He headed the RSS for much of the period that Atal Bihari Vajpayee was prime minister.

Born in Raipur into a Kannada Brahmin family June 18, 1931, Sudarshan studied to be a telecom engineer at Sagar University.

In 1953, at age 23, he plunged into social service as an RSS activist. He remained with the group till he breathed his last.

Serving as pracharak for six decades, he became its sarasanghachalak in 2000, succeeding Rajju Bhaiya to become the first south Indian to head the organisation.

A student of Marxism, he was a strong votary of ‘Swadeshi’. He also took a major initiative to reach out to Muslim and Christian communities.

He stepped down from the post in March 2009 due to poor health, and Mohan Bhagwat succeeded him.

In August, he had briefly gone missing during his morning walk in Mysore.