"I feel like having lost someone from my family," Mr Dharmadhikari said.
Social worker Appasaheb Dharmadhikari on Monday expressed grief over the death of 13 people after a ceremony in Navi Mumbai where he was felicitated with the Maharashtra Bhushan award a day before and said the incident should not be politicised.
The ceremony was organised in a sprawling 306-acre ground in Kharghar area on Sunday morning, which was attended by several lakh people, most of them followers of Dharmadhikari who was conferred with Maharashtra's top civilian award by Union Home Minister Amit Shah.
“The death of people due to sunstroke is painful for me. I feel like having lost someone from my family. I expect this incident should not be politicised in any way," Dharmadhikari said in a press statement.
“I am personally pained to see some people who are like my family members losing their lives due to sunstroke. It is like a calamity in my family. We all are together in this tragedy. The incident is very unfortunate,” he said.
Mr Dharmadhikari, 76, has a massive following in the state due to his tree plantation drives, blood donation and medical camps as well as de-addiction work in tribal areas conducted under the aegis of his organisation "Shree Sadasya".
Besides Shah, Maharashtra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde, Deputy CM Devendra Fadnavis, cabinet minister Sudhir Mungantiwar, MLAs and MLCs attended the event.
The Opposition has targetted the Shiv Sena-BJP government over the tragedy with Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Sanjay Raut on Monday alleging that "politics behind the award prevailed over people's convenience".
Leader of Opposition in the Maharashtra Assembly Ajit Pawar, who belongs to NCP, has sought an inquiry into how the event was organised during noon time when the temperature is very high.
"It needs to be probed as to who had fixed the noon timing for the award function," Mr Pawar said.
The Congress had demanded that accountability be fixed in what it said was a case of "culpable homicide".
(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by NDTV staff and is published from a syndicated feed.)