Rachana Dubey (BOMBAY TIMES; June 16, 2020)

A day after he died by suicide at his Bandra residence, Sushant Singh Rajput’s mortal remains were cremated on Monday evening. As rains lashed the city, the final rites were performed by the actor’s father and his sisters at Vile Parle’s Pawan Hans crematorium. Owing to the Coronavirus pandemic, only 20 people, whose names were shared with the police, were allowed inside. B-Town celebrities spotted outside the cremation ground include Rajkummar Rao, Shraddha Kapoor, Randeep Hooda, Ranvir Shorey, Vivek Anand Oberoi, Kriti Sanon, casting director-filmmaker Mukesh Chhabra, Varun Sharma, Dinesh Vijan, filmmaker Abhishek Kapoor and his producer wife Pragya, and Pooja Chopra.

Sushant’s family members, including his father, reached Mumbai from Patna earlier in the day. From the airport, they headed straight to his Bandra residence, where the actor had ended his life by hanging himself from a ceiling fan. A puja was reportedly performed in the apartment, before the family left for the final rites. Meanwhile, filmmaker Sandeep Ssingh, a close friend of Sushant, helped complete the formalities at Juhu’s Cooper Hospital, where his body was kept, and was in the ambulance that drove the mortal remains to the cremation ground.

Actress Rhea Chakraborty, Sushant’s rumoured girlfriend, who had paid a visit to the mortuary in the morning, was the first to arrive for his final rites. His family followed. Later, Sandeep Ssingh told BT, “It was heart-wrenching to see Sushant’s family break down inconsolably on seeing his body. His death makes me wonder why we make plans… he was to meet me for lunch one of these days, and discuss work. What pains me the most is the fact that he had so much bottled up inside; honestly, what led him to end his life in those final moments will continue to haunt me forever. No one knows and no one will ever know.”