Bhubaneswar: The BJP put up a major show of strength as state party president Basant Panda reached here on Wednesday evening with the urn containing the ashes of former Prime Minister, Atal Bihari Vajpayee.

Hundreds of party leaders and workers thronged the city airport to catch a glimpse of the metal pot carrying the mortal remains of late leader, whose appeal cut across party lines.

No sooner than Panda came out of the airport with the urn that the sankirtan (devotional songs) parties came alive while the assembled gathering of party leaders raised slogans of "Atal Bihari amar rahen".

The urn was taken to the party office here in a procession that took nearly one and a half hours to cover the distance of around five kilometers.

In the party office, the urn was placed on a platform for the people to pay their respects even as devotional songs were sung.

The mortal remains of the leader will be carried to Puri in a procession on Thursday morning for immersion in the sea there. Union ministers Jual Oram and Dharmendra Pradhan, state BJP president Basant Panda and BJP legislature party leader K.V. Singh Deo will accompany the urn to Puri.

The day after, the party will organise an all-party, all-faith prayer meeting in the honour of Vajpayee.

Chief minister Naveen Patnaik and leader of the Opposition Narasingha Mishra, among others, have been invited to attend the meeting.

State BJP vice-president Samir Mohanty said he alongwith Union minister Jual Oram had gone to invite Naveen to the August 24 meeting. "We hope he will attend the meeting," said Mohanty though ruling BJD sources refused to comment on the issue. "I have no information on this," said party spokesperson Sasmit Patra.

BJD spokesperson Samir Dash said there should be no attempt to extract political mileage out of it. BJP leader Samir Mohanty, however, deprecated the tendency of looking at everything through the prism of politics.