People try to catch a glimpse of Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, (in picture above) who, along with his wife Gursharan Kaur, visited Pramod Mahajan’s family on Saturday. Pictures by Gajanan Dudhalkar

Mumbai, May 6: Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and his wife Gursharan Kaur met Pramod Mahajan’s widow Rekha and her children this afternoon at Gopinath Munde’s flat in Purna apartments where the family is staying.

The Singhs also paid floral tributes to Mahajan’s portrait in the house of his brother-in-law Munde.

The Prime Minister turned emotional while speaking about his long association with Mahajan, who worked as the parliamentary affairs minister during the NDA regime. Singh hoped that the family would muster emotional strength to cope with the tragedy.

“The Prime Minister spent nearly 10 minutes talking to Rekha, Rahul, Poonam and Munde. He said Pramodji was a friend whom he admired for his balanced and thoughtful speeches in Parliament,” Maharashtra BJP chief Nitin Gadkari, who was present during the meeting, said. Mahajan’s mother Prabhavati was not present, he added.

Singh had expressed shock after news of Praveen Mahajan’s attack on his older brother reached him. Scheduled to leave for a five-day tour of Germany and Uzbekistan that afternoon, Singh wrote a letter to Rekha wishing Mahajan a speedy recovery before embarking on the visit.

A Mahajan aide said his family had moved out of their 15th floor rented apartment at Purna as they found it too traumatic to stay there after his death.

“Memories of that fateful morning would continue to haunt them for some time. At the moment, Rekhatai is staying with Mundeji. Rahul has moved to sister Poonam’s flat a few buildings away,” he said.

The BJP today deferred its two-day national executive meeting to May 27. The meeting, to be held in Delhi instead of Ludhiana, will discuss the party restructuring in the wake of Mahajan’s death as well as the Assembly results.

The state BJP announced that Opposition leader L.K. Advani, Shiv Sena chief Bal Thackeray, Union agriculture minister Sharad Pawar, CPM leader Sitaram Yechury and chief minister Vilasrao Deshmukh will be present at a condolence meeting on May 9.

The party will also immerse Mahajan’s ashes in rivers across Maharashtra. His family will travel to Nashik to immerse the ashes in the Godavari on Monday.