Ahmedabad : A UK-based Indian man who had travelled to Gujarat to fulfil his late wife’s final wish was among the 265 people killed in Thursday’s devastating Air India plane crash in Ahmedabad. Arjun Manubhai Patolia, 36, had returned to his ancestral village of Vadiya in Amreli district to immerse his wife’s ashes in the Narmada. His wife, Bharatiben, had died just a week earlier in London. Before Bharatiben passed away, she had asked her husband to take her ashes back to her motherland.
After completing funeral rites with relatives in Vadiya, Patolia was to return home to his two daughters, aged 4 and 8, who had remained in the UK. On Thursday, Patolia boarded an Air India flight headed to London’s Gatwick Airport. Then, tragedy struck. “He had a ticket on Air India flight AI171. He was supposed to go to London, but the accident happened,” Krish Jagdish Patolia, Arjun’s nephew, told media.
The massive Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner ploughed into a medical college hostel in a residential area. Videos showed the aircraft losing altitude as it struggled to gain lift before erupting into a fireball upon impact. There were 230 passengers, including 169 Indians and 53 British nationals, and 12 crew members on the plane. Only one person survived.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the crash site and met injured survivors at the Ahmedabad Civil Hospital on Friday, where identification of the victims is underway. A team of 70 to 80 doctors has been deployed for post-mortem examinations. So far, five victims have been identified and their bodies handed over to their families.
Investigators are continuing to examine the cause of the crash. Forensic teams are at the scene, and aviation authorities have opened a formal probe. Air India has not released a statement on the specific cause, but stated that emergency support is being provided to affected families.
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