Gauri Lankesh murder: Honour befitting the braveheart

BENGALURU: Amidst the chants of 'Amar Rahe Amar Rahe, Gauri Lankesh Amar Rahe' (Long Live Long Live, Gauri Lankesh Long Live), the mortal remains of the slain journalist and activist Gauri Lankesh (55) were lowered into the grave with police honours at the T.R. Mill Lingayat burial ground in Chamarajpet in Bengaluru on Wednesday evening. Ms. Gauri was assassinated by unidentified men on Tuesday evening at her residence in Rajarajeshwari Nagar in Bengaluru west.

Known for her left-leaning outlook and strong views against the Hindutva ideology and politics, Ms. Gauri was anti-ritual and was laid to rest accordingly, as her family members did not perform any rituals as wished by her.

Thousands of people, including actors, writers, activists and political leaders, braving the downpour, thronged the Ravindra Kalakshetra where the body of Ms. Gauri was kept for people to pay homage. Her body was brought to the Kalakshetra at around 1 pm after the post mortem was carried out at the Victoria Hospital.

Among the attendees were the General Secretary in-charge of AICC Karnataka KC Venugopal, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, Home Minister Ramalinga Reddy and most of their cabinet colleagues, JD(S) MLA B Z Zameer Ahmed Khan, multi-lingual actor Prakash Raj, playwrights, theatre personalities, journalists and social activists.

Recalling his last meeting with Ms. Gauri, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah said that she had met him last week to ask for advertisements for a Diwali special issue of her weekly Gauri Lankesh Patrike. Commenting on the investigation aspect, he said, "A special team has been formed and investigations have been taken up. The team has got some crucial clues and culprits will be caught soon," - Siddaramaiah

"She was a fearless journalist who fought throughout her life against the fundamentalists and to uphold the essence of secularism. She paid with her life for criticising the extreme views of right-wings. I understand the anguish of people after the incident. The state government should bring the culprits to book soon,"  said general secretary in-charge of AICC Karnataka KC Venugopal

“There is certainly a threat to freedom of expression in the country by a particular ideology which doesn't want any change and wishes to dwell in the mythological era and want to force it down the throats of others. They are against the new views put up by the progressive thinkers. Fundamentalism is the biggest evil and enemy of mankind,” said  rationalist and writer Prof. K S Bhagwan

"The incident is a dangerous development. I would not like to comment on the investigation part as it is still under process but would like to make it clear that there is a connection between this killing and the killings of MM Kalburgi, Govind Pansare, and Narendra Dabholkar. It's a systematic attempt to silence those who practice their freedom of expression which is against a particular ideology, striking at the very roots of our democratic setup. It is a challenge for government to catch the culprits which we would do soon and make sure this is the last such incident,” said  KPCC working president Dinesh Gundu Rao

"I can only describe her as an ideal journalist. She was bold. She was determined and ready to face any consequences. I think she was facing six to seven cases in the courts. She had told me once that she was getting hate emails. She knew she had a lot of enemies,” said writer G. Rajashekhar.