MUMBAI, INDIA, January 28, 2008: “The light that has illumined this country for these many years will illumine this country for many more years, and a thousand years later, that light will be seen in this country and the world will see it and it will give solace to innumerable hearts,” Said Jawahar Lal Nehru during Gandhi’s funeral, knowing that the Mahatma’s legacy would live on. He will be honorored as he had chosen, in a Hindu ceremony disposing his ashes in the sea.
Gandhi’s newly discovered ashes will be kept safe till the evening of January 30, a day that marks 60 years since the Mahatma’s assassination. After that, they will finally be immersed in the sea as per Hindu tradition. Gandhi’s ashes were originally divided and sent to all the states of India to be scattered in rivers, according to Hindu ritual. For reasons no one knows, portions of the ashes remained under private possession. It is unknown whether these were the last of Gandhi’s mortal remains.
In August 2006, a Dubai-based businessman Bharat Narayan handed over the ashes that had been with his parents since 1948.