President George W Bush faced a chorus of protest as he honoured the memory of Mahatma Gandhi during his visit to India. Before signing a historic nuclear deal yesterday, Mr Bush, a believer in the doctrine of military pre-emption, sprinkled rose petals over the memorial to the philosopher of non-violence.

Forty-nine years after he was killed by a Hindu die-hard and cremated in Delhi, Mohandas Gandhi's ashes, kept in a bank vault, will be immersed in the Ganges river this month, Indian officials said today.

The ashes, which were placed by Gandhi's aides in a locker in the State Bank of India in Cuttack, in the eastern state of Orissa, were to be handed over to his great grandson, Tushar Arun Gandhi, on Monday, the Press Trust of India reported.

It was unclear what had taken so long for the ashes to be handed over to his relatives. But some politicians had said the ashes were a hoax and sought a chemical test to prove their authenticity. The test was denied by the Supreme Court, which has now ordered their return.

The ashes are to be placed in an urn and taken to several places across the country linked with Gandhi's nonviolent campaign against British rule. Then, in a Hindu ceremony on Jan. 30, the ashes will be immersed in the Ganges.

We stand on the shoulders of Gandhi. I submit that he would ask, that by standing on his shoulders, we reach higher, that we not pause too long in front of his statues, but that we must work, work, work.

I believe that Gandhi was totally correct when he said "We must be the change we wish to see." The point where change must occur is at the individual, personal level, multiplied by about 6 billion. As the cartoon character Pogo said, "We have met the enemy and they is us."

Once when Gandhi’s great friend, the Nobel Laureate Rabindranath Tagore, was visiting a Bedouin camp in Iraq, the chief told Tagore, "Our prophet has said that a true Muslim is he who, by his words and deeds not the least of his brother-men may ever come to any harm." Tagore then noted in his diary, "I was startled into recognizing in his words the voice of essential humanity."

Hindu priests who look after the memorial of Indian independence leader Mohandas Gandhi conducted a purification ceremony at the shrine after a visit from President Bush…. the memorial was cleansed with water brought from the Ganges river, which Hindus consider holy, the Hindustan Times newspaper reported Sunday.

The last sounds a bit like a Catholic exorcism, where priests sprinkle holy water on a person inhabited by a demon, doesn't it?