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NEW DELHI: Former Indian President Pranab Mukherjee, who tested positive for COVID-19 earlier this month, died on Monday (August 31) at the age of 84, after weeks in hospital, his son and wife said. current president’s office.
He died of multiple organ failure after being admitted to the hospital weeks ago, and also tested positive for COVID-19 on August 10.
A veteran politician who served as minister of foreign affairs and finance in previous administrations, Mukherjee was in a deep coma and on respiratory support after suffering a lung infection.
“His disappearance is passing an era,” the office of President Ram Nath Kovind said in a tweet.
The Bengali-born politician was protected from former Prime Minister Indira Gandhi and was a member of her cabinet when she suspended democratic rights in the infamous “Emergency” from 1975 to 1977.
Mukherjee’s star faded after Gandhi’s assassination in 1984 when he was a rival of his son and heir Rajiv Gandhi for the leadership of the Congress party.
He briefly separated from Congress, but after Rajiv Gandhi was assassinated in 1991, his political fortune revived.
He became Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s right-hand man during his decade in power from 2004 to 2014, serving as Minister of Defense, Foreign Affairs and Finance, gaining a cross-party reputation as a skilled negotiator.
However, Mukherjee’s performance as finance minister was criticized for his inability to push through economic liberalization measures.
In 2012, he stepped away from active politics and assumed the largely ceremonial role of president, serving a five-year term until 2017.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi, of the arch-rival nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party, said Mukherjee “left an indelible mark on our nation’s development trajectory.
“A quintessential academic, a towering statesman, he was admired across the political spectrum,” Modi said on Twitter.
Current President Ram Nath Kovind called Mukherjee “a colossus in public life” who served India “with the spirit of a sage.”
