13-06-2025
‘Were good people…didn't deserve this': Kin mourn as dreams of starting new life meet tragic end in final flight
They were good people…didn't deserve this, shared a heart broken Kuldeep Bhatt, who along with his cousin Prabuddha Vyas had arrived in Ahmedabad from Rajasthan's Banswara to inquire about their family members — the doctor couple along with their three children — who died in the Gatwick-bound Air India flight, a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, that crashed within minutes of take off and burst into flames.
On Friday noon, Vyas and Bhatt were at Ahmedabad's Meghaninagar police station inquiring about the belongings of their family members — radiologist Dr Pratik Joshi (46), his wife Dr Komi Vyas (39), their elder daughter Miraya (8), and five-year-old twins — Nakul and Pradyut. The two men had reached the police station, located about 2 km from the crash site, after Prabuddha Vyas, the younger sibling of Dr Komi, submitted his DNA samples at the Kasauti Bhavan of BJ Medical College in Ahmedabad Civil Hospital.
The doctor couple had settled their affairs in India and were permanently immigrating to the United Kingdom. However, their dreams of starting a new chapter were brutally shattered by the fatal crash.
The couple's last message to their families — a selfie of all five of them seated in the ill-fated Boeing aircraft — sent to the family WhatsApp group just minutes before take-off which was supposed to be a happy memory unfortunately became their last.
Dr Pratik Joshi, who had earlier worked at Zydus Hospital in Ahmedabad, had moved to London about six years ago even as his wife, who was also earlier at Zydus with her husband, had eventually moved to Pacific Medical College and Hospital in Rajasthan's Udaipur.
'Since Dr Pratik had completed about six years working in the UK, where his family said he was employed at a private hospital… he now wanted to take his family there. That is why he had come to India,' said Bhatt.
'They were good, decent people who didn't deserve this,' said Bhatt.
Bhatt said that both of Dr Pratik's parents were also doctors in Rajasthan. His father had come to Ahmedabad to give his DNA sample.
Meanwhile, a doctor at Zydus Hospital in Ahmedabad told The Indian that Pratik had visited them just a day before his flight.