Flight Lieutenant Tapan Kapoor who died in a chopper crash on Tuesday in Uttarakhand
Shops around Chandni Chowk's famous Paranthewali Gali in Delhi were closed on Wednesday. The area was paying respect to Flight Lieutenant Tapan Kapoor of the Indian Air Force who died in a helicopter crash on Tuesday in flood-ravaged Uttarakhand.
A neighbour said, "It's like we lost the ground beneath our feet. We were stunned. The child who we saw growing up before our eyes became a Flight Lieutenant in the Air Force and has now made us so proud. His achievement is unparalleled."
The Russian-made MI-17 helicopter that crashed on Tuesday afternoon into the side of a mountain was one of three flying back from
Kedarnath, the epicenter of the disaster. On board were five air force personnel, six men from the Indo-Tibetan Border Police (ITBP) and nine from the National Disaster Response Force (NDRF). All of them died, 17 bodies have been recovered so far from the narrow, treacherous valley where it crashed.
(The heroes who died)Sanjiv Kumar of the Indo-Tibetan Border Police was also on that helicopter. The oldest of three siblings, he belonged to Patnari village in Ballia district of Uttar Pradesh and had enlisted in 2007. Sanjiv's father Gautam Kumar said he was proud to have given a son in service of the nation. "He had gone to Kedarnath from Ghaziabad... we had no contact with him for more than ten days... I am proud that he lost his life for the country," the martyr's father said.
Sanjiv's friend, Nitesh Singh reminisced, "He was a very bright boy since childhood. When we came home on leave, he would play cricket with us... we are proud that he died saving the life of others."
In Madurai, a mother waited for a promised telephone call from her young son. But when the phone did ring, it was with the news that Indian Air Force pilot Flight Lieutenant K Praveen had died.
The 26-year-old, too, was on board the helicopter that crashed. He had told his mother that he would talk to her after he finished the day's flights to ferry people to safety.
"He was my only son. He used to be always active. Becoming a pilot was his ambition and after a brief stint in software firm TCS, he joined the Air Force," his mother Manjula, a railway employee, said.
(Read)A day after the helicopter crash, Air Chief Marshal NAK Browne vowed that operations to locate and assist thousands who remain stranded in Uttarakhand would continue. "I met the boys today and I told them our rotors will not stop turning," he said and pledged, "We have to finish the mission and finish it right. We will make sure that the job is done."