Latest news with #SudiptoGanguly
The Star
18 hours ago
- Politics
- The Star
India says international court lacks authority to rule on Pakistan water treaty
NEW DELHI (Reuters) -The international Court of Arbitration lacks any legal authority to make pronouncements on the Indus Waters Treaty between India and Pakistan as New Delhi has never recognised the legitimacy of the court, India's foreign ministry said on Thursday. A ruling from the Court of Arbitration last week backed Pakistan by saying that India must adhere to the Indus Waters Treaty in the design of new hydro-electric power stations on rivers that flow west into Pakistan. (Reporting by Shivam Patel; Writing by Sudipto Ganguly; editing by YP Rajesh)
Mint
15-06-2025
- General
- Mint
In Air India crash, canteen worker hopes for second miracle
By Sudipto Ganguly and Sumit Khanna AHMEDABAD, India, June 15 (Reuters) - Around 30 minutes before an Air India jet crashed into a college hostel in India, Ravi Thakor, the cook in the hostel canteen, and his wife stepped out to deliver lunchboxes - leaving behind their two-year-old daughter and his mother. The grandmother and child are missing. Thakor is hoping for what he calls a "second miracle", one like the astonishing survival of the sole passenger among the 242 people on board the plane. Thakor said he first thought the loud bang he heard when the plane crashed on Thursday in the western city of Ahmedabad was a gas cylinder blast, but soon noticed the building he had just left was engulfed in flames. For days, he's been searching for his mother and his daughter at hospitals and the morgue to no avail. Police told Reuters they were treating it as a missing persons case. "If one of the plane passengers could survive the crash, there could be a second miracle and my mother and daughter could also be safe," a visibly distraught Thakor told Reuters outside one of the hospitals. His wife Lalita stood beside him, stone-faced. "We realise that the chances of finding them alive are bleak but we have not given up hope," Thakor said. In all, at least 271 people died in the crash - the 241 passengers and crew in the plane, and the rest people on the ground, mostly in the hostel building. Thakor and his wife have given samples of their DNA to hospital authorities but they are yet to hear if any matches have been found among the deceased. Families of victims have been waiting to take posession of their loved ones' remains for days as DNA profiling and other identification checks are taking time. The hospital's additional superintendent, Rajnish Patel, said on Sunday DNA samples of only 32 deceased have been matched so far. When the Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner jet struck the hostel canteen on Thursday, many students were eating lunch. Steel tumblers and plates still containing food lay on the few tables that were left intact when Reuters visited the site later. Thakor's mother was still cooking when he and his wife left the hostel that day to deliver lunchboxes and he had just rocked rocked his daugher to sleep on a wooden swing, he said. "It is possible someone took away my daughter in the chaos that followed," he said.
The Star
14-06-2025
- General
- The Star
At least 270 bodies recovered from Air India crash site, hospital official says
AHMEDABAD, India (Reuters) -At least 270 bodies have been recovered after a London-bound Air India plane crashed into a medical college hostel in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad this week, a hospital official told reporters on Saturday. The Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with 242 people on board bound for Gatwick Airport on Thursday began losing height moments after take-off and erupted in a fireball as it hit buildings below. (Reporting by Sudipto Ganguly and Sumit Khanna in Ahmedabad; Writing by Shivam Patel; Editing by Stephen Coates)
Yahoo
13-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Anxious families await dental identification of Air India crash victims
By Sudipto Ganguly AHMEDABAD, India (Reuters) -Dozens of anxious family members sat outside an Indian hospital waiting to collect bodies of loved ones killed in Thursday's Air India plane crash, as doctors worked overnight to gather dental samples from the deceased and run identification checks. In the world's worst aviation disaster in a decade, an Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner with 242 people on board bound for London took off from Ahmedabad, but descended and crashed within about 30 seconds, erupting into a massive fireball. Outside the B.J. Medical College in Ahmedabad, an elderly woman said four of her relatives including two children were onboard the flight, but declined to speak further to the media until the bodies were handed over. "Can you give us the dead bodies? If not then we will not give interviews. We are so tired now," she said in frustration. Other relatives sat patiently at the hospital where many have in recent hours given blood samples for DNA profiling at a dedicated centre for collection. At the hospital, Jaishankar Pillai, a forensic dentist, told reporters the doctors were in the autopsy room until 4:30 a.m. on Friday collecting dental samples, as "teeth can withstand the heat", and they hoped they could use them for identification. "We have recorded the dental records of 135 charred victims ... it's a very pathetic situation," said Pillai, adding he did not have data for how many bodies had been identified so far. Officials outside the autopsy room told Reuters at least seven bodies had been handed over to their relatives after identification checks. In the case of dental records, a person is not typically identified based on a relative's teeth, but through reference to the victim's prior dental charts, radiographs, mouth guards or other records. Pillai added that even a selfie photograph of the victim could help doctors match the gap between two teeth to run checks. Scenes of distress played out beside the autopsy room. Daksha Patni was mourning the loss of her relative, 14-year-old Akash Patni, and wailing as she waited for his body. The cause of the crash, the first for a Boeing Dreamliner wide-body airliner, has not yet been determined and India's aviation minister said a formal investigation had begun. A family member of another victim, 81-year-old Abdur Razzaq Chitthi Wala, told IANS news agency he was not being allowed to verify the body. "I received a video showing his body, it's burnt, but the face is clearly visible. All I'm asking is to let me verify the body," said the relative, who did not share his name during the interview. "They are saying give your blood sample, and you will get a call." (Writing by Aditya Kalra, Editing by William Maclean)
Yahoo
13-06-2025
- General
- Yahoo
Lunch plates abandoned, plane parts embedded in walls after Air India jet hit doctors' hostel
By Sudipto Ganguly and Abhijith Ganapavaram AHMEDABAD, India (Reuters) -Lunch break at a doctors' hostel in India's Ahmedabad turned fatal for many in the dining area when parts of an Air India aircraft crashed through its roof as the plane hurtled to the ground moments after takeoff, killing more than 240 people. Only one passenger survived the crash of the London-bound Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner jet on Thursday, the world's worst aviation disaster in a decade. As many as 24 people on the ground were also killed, according to local media. A day later, Thakur Ravi, who worked in the kitchen at the B.J. Medical College hostel, is still searching for his mother - a cook there - and his two-year-old daughter, who he left under her care. The last time he saw them was before he set off to deliver lunch boxes to senior doctors at the hospital, about half an hour before the crash. "All the other ladies who cook food at the hostel managed to escape, but my mother and daughter got left inside ... I have searched everywhere but have not found them," he told reporters on Friday. At least four undergraduate students and five relatives of students were killed in the crash, a resident doctor, who is part of the junior doctors' association at the college, told Reuters on the condition of anonymity. Images of the dining area shortly after the incident showed wheels and other parts of the aircraft embedded in the walls, while debris and belongings of the students, including clothes and books, lay scattered on the floor. Steel tumblers and plates still containing some food lay on the few tables that were left intact, with a section of the aircraft that was partially wedged on top of the damaged building giving an indication of the devastation inside. A strong stench of jet fuel hung in the air at the site on Friday, as authorities used cranes to remove charred trees and debris, while a portion of the wall of the top floor of the hostel lay on the ground. Loud wails could be heard at the home of Akash, a resident of Ahmedabad who was charred to death as he rushed to save his mother who ran a tea stall near the hostel and was caught in the blaze of the crash but managed to escape. "Her son ran in to save her but got blinded by the smoke completely burnt. He died in front of our eyes," Akash's aunt, Jasi, told Reuters, adding that his mother sustained burn injuries and was undergoing treatment. (Writing by Sakshi Dayal; Editing by YP Rajesh and Philippa Fletcher)
