Raiganj/Calcutta: Thousands, including leaders from across the political spectrum, thronged to pay tributes to Priya Ranjan Das Munshi in his final journey on Tuesday.

The veteran Congress leader had died in a Delhi hospital on Monday.

Such was the intensity of the popular sentiment in his home district of North Dinajpur that police struggled to rein in the crowds that repeatedly breached barricades to reach his mortal remains.

Towns like Raiganj and Kaliaganj witnessed a voluntary, virtual shutdown through the day as people mourned their beloved leader, who passed away at the age of 72, after nine years of being in coma following a stroke in October 2008.

After the chopper carrying the former Union minister's body reached Raiganj around 4.30pm, common people, supporters and Congress workers rushed to the helipad, having waited for hours to see Das Munshi.

In North Dinajpur, as well as in Calcutta earlier in the day, people from the Congress, Trinamul Congress, the Left and even the BJP were present to witness the leader's final journey.

Das Munshi's mortal remains, which had arrived in Calcutta on Monday night, were taken out of Peace Haven, a central Calcutta mortuary, and taken to the state Congress headquarters at Bidhan Bhavan in a hearse.

"He suffered a lot for nine years. Now he is no more.... For all these years, we had hoped and prayed for his recovery. A fighter through his life, he could not win this final battle," said his wife Deepa, the former Raiganj MP.

After several stops in Calcutta, Kaliaganj and Raiganj, where he received a guard of honour, Das Munshi was cremated late on Tuesday night.

In Calcutta, the cortege was also taken to Calcutta High Court, where Das Munshi was once registered as a lawyer, followed by his Kalighat home.

At the headquarters of the Congress in Bengal, state party president Adhir Chowdhury, leader of the Opposition Abdul Mannan, Left Front chairman Biman Bose, CPM state secretary Surjya Kanta Mishra and BJP leader Samik Bhattacharya paid their last respects to the leader in the presence of wife Deepa and son Priyadeep.

In North Dinajpur, the likes of Congress's Lok Sabha member Mausam Noor, AICC member C.P. Joshi, Trinamul ministers Subrata Mukherjee and Gautam Deb were present.

"This is one of the saddest moments of my life. I have been overwhelmed by the pain since yesterday. I am yet to be able to start processing this loss," said panchayat minister Mukherjee, one of Das Munshi's closest proteges since the 1960s.