NEW DELHI -- The Hindu today carried a heartwarming story about how a Muslim woman lit the funeral pyre for Keerthi Srinivas, a 70-year-old Hindu, after his son refused to perform the last rites because he had converted to Christianity.
Yakub Bi, who performed the last rites for Srinivas, and her husband, Md. Mahboob Ali, runs an old-age home in Telangana, where they are currently taking care of 70 people. Srinivas, who at stayed at Yakub's old age home for two years, died a few days after suffering a stroke.
"We have vowed to serve the old and infirm and we definitely care for them, when it comes to giving them an honourable farewell from the material world,” Yakub told The Hindu.
Srinivas was against his son converting to Christianity, and in the end he refused to light his father's funeral pyre, the newspaper reported.
After his son refused, Yakub lit the pyre after taking three rounds of the body as per Hindu customs. “We have only one religion and that is serving people. We honour the sentiments of our inmates,” she told The Hindu.
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