FITTING FAREWELL

The farewell accorded to Assam’s heartthrob by the people of Assam, and the State Government will go down in history as a unique episode in governance, solidarity and unrelenting adulation for an artiste. The number of people who poured their heart out for their beloved singer, cutting across caste, sex, and religion divide, was unprecedented. The fact that the surge was led by the youth was even more heartening, save few incidents of transgressing of law and order. However, what was clearly visible to all and sundry across the India and beyond the seven seas was the role of the Government of Assam in managing this sudden affair.
The news of Zubeen’s passing away in Singapore had caught everyone by surprise, and excruciating sadness. However, the Government of the day led by the Chief Minister Dr. Himanta Biswa Sarma swung into action to give a fitting farewell to an icon sans parallel in Assam of the present. The visuals of the Chief Minister receiving the mortal remains of the singer at the IGI Airport in New Delhi drove home the importance of the person and the magnitude of the development. From there on, till his ashes were taken to his ancestral town of Jorhat, it was the Government that led from the front, and rightly so, for Zubeen was an artiste of the people.