UK mourns as Air India crash leaves girls orphaned, £620k raised

MEMBERS of the public raised more than £620,000 for two young British girls who lost their father in the Air India crash, when he travelled to Gujarat to scatter his wife’s ashes.

Arjun Patoliya was travelling home to his daughters, aged four and eight, after performing the last rites of his wife Bharti, who had died just weeks earlier, when the plane crashed last Thursday (12).

“The husband went to do the rituals in India and coming back, he was on board. He has left two little girls behind and the girls are now orphans,” said Anjana Patel, the mayor of Harrow borough, at a multifaith vigil for those killed in last Thursday’s plane crash.

“I really hope that those girls will be looked after by all of us,” Patel said. “We don’t have any words to describe how the families and friends must be feeling, so what we can do is pray for them,” she added.

A GoFundMe page set up for the sisters showed £629,000 had been raised (exceeding the target of £500,000) as of Tuesday (17), when Eastern Eye went to print. All funds raised will go direct to a legal trust or the appointed guardians to ensure every penny is dedicated to the girls’ needs, a note on the fundraiser page said.

Among other passengers were Dr Prateek Joshi, a consultant radiologist at Royal Derby Hospital and Queen’s Hospital Burton under the University Hospitals of Derby and Burton NHS Foundation Trust (UHDB). He was travelling with his pathologist wife Dr Komi Vyas and their daughter Miraya, eight, and five-year-old twin sons Pradyut and Nakul.

The family hoped to relocate to the UK.

“It is hard to accept that a man with such a passion for life, and his beautiful young family, have been taken in this way,” said Dr Rajeev Singh, consultant radiologist and clinical director for imaging at UHDB, who knew the family well. “

Prateek was full of joy, he was a wonderful man, friend, husband and father, and an exceptional radiologist who was highly respected in his field. He approached everything with a smile, radiated positivity and had a great sense of humour,” he added.

The colleague and friend said Prateek moved to Derby from India in 2021 and entertained colleagues with stories about his passions outside work, including a “newly discovered love of fish and chips and enthusiasm for walking in the Peak District”. Singh added, “He touched the lives of so many people, both through his clinical work and as a colleague and friend to many.”

UHDB chief executive, Stephen Posey, said: “Prateek was not only an excellent doctor for whom nothing was too much trouble, but also a warm, smiling and kind man who was a hugely liked and valued member of the team.

“We are privileged that Prateek chose to give his skills, talent and knowledge to the NHS, and he will be sorely missed by everyone who had the pleasure of working with him.”

Last Saturday (14), the Derby Hindu Temple held prayers in memory of the Joshi family and other victims of the tragedy.

Another passenger, Lawrence Christian, 30, had flown to India to bury his father.

“When he sat on the plane, he saw me over a video call and bid adieu,” his mother Ravina said at her home in Ahmedabad, sobbing inconsolably as she sat with her daughter Rinal.

“The last thing he said was that he was switching off his phone and would call me after he lands.”

Ravina Christian lost her husband, Daniel, in May to heart-related complications, and their son was the only bread-winner in the family.

Christian’s grandmother, Salvina Christian, said: “We have lost everything, the three of us have been left here. Our strength, our pride, everything has gone. We have lost the light of our home.”

Businessman Suresh Mistry, 53, said his daughter Kinal was a trained dancer, an excellent cook and a yoga enthusiast.

A chef in London, she had been visiting her family in India and postponed her flight to stay a few more days.

Mistry described the last time he spoke to her, when she called to say the plane was about to take off and he could head back home without any worry. He said he couldn’t stop thinking about how, if she had stuck to her original plan, “she would have been alive”.

Imitaz Ali Sayed waited to hear if his brother Sayed Javed Ali, his brother’s wife, six-yearold son and four-year-old daughter, had been identified following the crash.

The four were visiting India for a family Eid celebration and to visit their mother.

Anil Patel’s son and daughter-in-law had surprised him with a visit from Britain. He said, “I saw my child for the first time in two years, it was a great time. And now, there is nothing.” Breaking down in tears, he said, “Whatever the gods wanted has happened.”

While communities were in mourning, one woman recounted how she survived by arriving late at the Ahmedabad airport. “The airline staff had already closed the check-in,” said 28-year-old Bhoomi Chauhan. “At that moment, I kept thinking if only we had left a little earlier, we wouldn’t have missed our flight,” she said.

At least 38 people were killed on the ground when the nose and front wheel of the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner landed on a canteen building where medical students were having lunch. They included teenager Akash Patni, who media reported had been snoozing under a tree in the fierce heat of the day near his family’s tea stall in Ahmedabad.

“He caught fire in front of my eyes,” his mother Kalpesh Patni said, weeping. “I won’t be able to live without him,” she told the Indian Express newspaper.

Mohit Chavda, 25, a junior doctor in Ahmedabad, described how he escaped through choking black smoke after the plane smashed into the dining hall. “There was almost zero visibility,” Chavda said. “We were not able to see even who was sitting beside us – so we just ran from there, unsure if we would make it out alive.” (Agencies)