Heer and Dheer Bakshi --- two British nationals in their mid-twenties --- who had travelled from London to meet their grandmother in Ahmedabad, were among the 241 passengers killed when a Gatwick-bound Air India flight crashed near Ahmedabad airport on June 12.

“The two sisters were on their return journey to London when disaster struck. They had come with their parents to meet their ‘nani’ (maternal grandmother) in Ahmedabad. The parents were scheduled to depart for the UK by a separate flight next week. They were my sister’s only children. Now both of them are gone,” said a heart-broken Kartik Vasavda, the uncle of the two sisters, who had accompanied the parents of the deceased sisters to provide DNA samples at the Ahmedabad civil hospital on Friday.

One of the two sisters was a fashion designer by profession, and the other was employed with a software firm in the UK. “We have given our DNA samples and were waiting to go to the post-mortem room to try and identify their bodies. But we have been prevented from doing so. We have been waiting here for the past two hours, and it seems we will have to return home,” Vasavda said, adding that the hospital authorities said the family would be asked to return to the hospital in a couple of days after the DNA samples are matched with the bodies.

Of the son who came to pay his last respects to his father

A few meters away from the DNA sampling room, a resident of Naroda locality, Gunvanti Robert Christian was found sobbing inconsolably outside the post-mortem room where bodies of the deceased passengers and other victims who died in the air crash have been kept. “My nephew Lawarence Daniel Christian was on the London flight. He was studying in the UK and had come to attend the final rites of his father, who had passed away after a heart attack in Ahmedabad. Before he travelled, we had tried to convince him that we would show him the final rites on a video call. But Lawrence did not agree and flew down to Ahmedabad on June 1,” said Gunvanti Christian, before breaking down in tears. Family members accompanying the grieving family member said Gunvanti had given her DNA samples on Thursday, but had revisited the hospital premises in the hope of seeing and identifying the body of Lawrence.

Meanwhile, black and white ‘Dead Body Vans’ were lined up outside the postmortem room. On Friday, hospital authorities released six bodies, whose faces were intact and could be identified. Though the Gujarat government has been silent on the exact number of casualties even 24 hours after the incident, official sources told the businessline that the number of dead was expected to exceed 241, a death-toll confirmed by Air India.

Casualty on the ground

Close to the post-mortem room, Kalpesh Parekh sits wailing on a concrete-bench under a tree. “They are not allowing me to see my brother’s body,” says Kalpesh, crying out loudly for his 15-year-old brother, who used to run a tea-stall with the help of his mother near the SRP camp at Meghaninagar, the spot where the plane crashed. The impact from the crash destroyed the tea-stall, killed his brother and left his mother severely burnt. “My mother is being treated in hospital. But they took my brother away and did not allow me to see him. My mother got burnt when she tried to save my brother,” Kalpesh added.

A narrow escape

Meanwhile, at the aircraft crash-site in Meghaninagar, residents continued to recount tales of horror that unfolded on Thursday afternoon. Vijay Singal (25), who lives in Gujarat Housing Board apartments located 500 meters from the crash site said, “I was leaving for work after lunch, when I heard a loud explosion. Initially, I was scared, but then decided to head in the direction of the explosion. When I reached the spot, I saw a lot of local people trying to help those who had got burnt. The accident site was very hot and very difficult to approach. When fire-tenders arrived, we saw a number of human limbs scattered around. Police soon cordoned off the site,” said Singal, who works as a sanitary inspector at the civil hospital.

Rahul Patni (23), another resident of Meghaninagar, who drives an auto rickshaw for a living, recounted how completely charred bodies were pulled out of the wreckage on Thursday, “We were saved. My house is just 600 meters from the accident site and if the plane had flown for a few meters more, it would have crashed into a densely populated zone killing thousands. I was at home resting after lunch, when I heard a deafening explosion. Mataji (Goddess) saved us,” Patni remarked.

Police and hospital authorities have barricaded the section of the civil hospital where the lone survivor of the Air India crash and 50 other injured persons are housed. “For the safety of those injured, we are not allowing anyone inside,” said a Gujarat police official on guard at the door. On Friday morning, Prime Minister Narendra Modi visited the injured persons, as well as the lone survivor, who is a British national.

Published on June 13, 2025