Even the death of Lata Mangeshkar, the legendary playback singer whose career spanned seven decades, could not unite India.
Mangeshkar died at the age of 92 after weeks of hospitalization due to a COVID infection.
Why did Lata Mangeshkar died?
After her death, the Indian government announced two days of mourning and cremated her body with full state honors.
As condolence messages started pouring from all over the world, some Indian liberals found it pertinent to point out that Mangeshkar was a supporter of the Hindu nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Hindutva (Hindu supremacy) ideology, hence her musical legacy should not be celebrated.
Some liberals said the state honor for the late singer was proof that she was close to the ruling party, ignoring Mangeshkar’s remarkable body of work – over 25,000 songs in more than 2,000 Indian films.
Another controversy erupted during her last rites.
Scores of prominent Bollywood figures attended Mangeshkar’s last rites in Mumbai. Shah Rukh Khan, nicknamed “King of Bollywood,” also joined the funeral to pay his respects to the “Nightingale of India.”
But he landed in a controversy after a video emerged in which he is reciting an Islamic verse and then blowing air to ward off “evil spirits,” which is an Islamic custom.
