Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswa Sarma on Wednesday said that Shyamkanu Mahanta, chief organiser of the North East India Festival, and any organisation associated with him will be prohibited from holding events in the state.

This comes days after Assamese singer Zubeen Garg died on September 19 in Singapore. Garg died during a yacht trip a day before he was set to perform at the three-day festival organised by Mahanta.

A death certificate issued by the Singaporean authorities on September 20 stated the cause of Garg’s death as drowning. He was cremated with state honours and a 21-gun salute at Kamarkuchi village, about 20 km from Guwahati, on Tuesday.

On Wednesday, Sarma said that the state government will not provide any financial grant, advertisement or sponsorship to events linked to Mahanta.

“The state government will also request the Government of India not to extend any financial assistance or sponsorship to him in any manner,” the Bharatiya Janata Party leader added.

Mahanta has been the chief organiser of the North East India Festival since 2013, an event which has expanded over the years from its first venue in New Delhi to several international cities, The Hindu reported.

After Garg’s death, over 50 first information reports were filed against Mahanta and Garg’s manager, Siddharth Sharma, The Hindu reported. Subsequently, the state government instructed the Crime Investigation Department to club the cases and probe the circumstances that led to the accident.

Earlier, Mahanta and his team issued a statement on social media saying that they had “no prior knowledge” of Garg taking the yacht trip.

“Zubeen had told the festival organising team that he wanted to go to Singapore and we arranged for his stay at a hotel,” Mahanta had also told PTI. “He had not come for the festival alone but had also made his own plans with members of the Assam Association in Singapore.”

Born in 1972 in Meghalaya, Garg primarily worked in the Assamese, Bengali and Hindi-language film and music industries. The Assamese singer had sung in more than 40 languages and dialects.

In 2006, he sang Ya Ali from the Hindi film Gangster, which made him a nationwide success. Among other prominent Hindi songs by him are Subah Subah and Kya Raaz Hai.

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