Karnataka’s 111-year-old seer dead

Tumakuru (Karnataka): Karnataka’s 111-year-old revered seer, Shivakumara Swami of Siddaganga Mutt here, the most influential leader of the Lingayat community, died early on Monday following protracted illness.

Thousands of grieving followers gathered at his hermitage where he was shifted to on January 16 on his own request although he had not fully recovered in the hospital where he was warded. He miraculously recovered but breathed his last on Monday morning. As news of his death spread, many men and women broke down outside his ashram.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Congress President Rahul Gandhi, BJP President Amit Shah and scores of political leaders in Karnataka, including Chief Minister H.D. Kumaraswamy, mourned his death. “His holiness passed away at 11.44 a.m. at the Mutt during treatment for lung infection,” Kumaraswamy told the media in Tumakuru, about 70 km northwest of here. (IANS)

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