Air India crash, a year later: At crash site, families and friends sift for memories and a life that once was

Family members and loved ones of several victims of the tragedy gathered on Friday at the crash site in the Meghaninagar area of Ahmedabad to mark one year since the crash. Police allowed family members to walk past the cordon, into the site. Navigating the heap of debris that is still there, the mourners walked up to piles of earth, burnt metal, and rubber, to spend a few quiet minutes.

Wearing a beige thobe, Dr Salim Mister arrived by train from Bharuch to pay homage to his wife, Sajeda, who was a passenger on the plane. Walking to the site on the sultry afternoon, the sweat on his face merged with tears.

“Ek saal ho gaya (a year has passed)… She was going to be with my daughter, who was pregnant and settled in London,” he says. Mister has three daughters, two of whom are settled in London, and a son, who is in Canada.

“We are keen to know what will come out in the final investigation report… The pilot must have naturally tried till the end to save [the passengers], and his own life was also at stake,” he tells The Indian Express.

Another man grieving the loss of his wife in the crash was Gunjankumar Naran Chaudhary. His wife, Jaymini, had come back to India from London to visit her parents and was returning to the UK when tragedy struck. She was two months pregnant at the time.

“On June 8, I had ordered a birthday cake for Jaymini from Patel bakery in Valsad, where she had gone to visit her parents. She was going to come back home to London on June 12. That day, I lost everything — my partner of 12 years and my child who had not yet been born,” says Chaudhary, tears welling up in his eyes as he visited the crash site. In his mid-thirties, Chaudhary travelled from Kalol in Gandhinagar with a picture of his wife and prayed at the spot.

Gunjan Chaudhary with portrait of his wife Jaymini at the crash site. (Express Photo By Bhupendra Rana)

The couple, who had been together for the last 12 years — two years of engagement and 10 years of marriage — had initially put off plans to have children as they looked to move to the UK. In 2022, both secured jobs there: Gunjan in a chemical firm and Jaymini in a healthcare company.

“On May 8, 2025, Jaymini had come home for the first time since we left India together in 2022. I had visited once back in 2024, so this was my second visit. We had not spent a single moment apart since we had been together, but since I had to go back to the UK early due to lack of leave, I left on May 21, and Jaymini was to follow on June 12. This was the first time I had left her side, and this happened,” says Chaudhary.

Filmmaker Milan Sharma and family came to the site and placed a photograph of his sister, Anju, on the boundary wall of the hostel buildings. A year earlier, Milan and Anju had travelled from Vadodara to Ahmedabad to catch flights to different destinations. While Milan was headed to Mumbai for work, Anju was flying to London to meet her elder daughter, Nimmi. He recalls that his sister had, at 1.09 pm, put a status on social media, saying, “Aadmi kuch nahi, ek khilauna hai (Man is nothing but a toy).”

“My flight to Mumbai was at 11.45 am and Anju’s flight, AI 171, was scheduled for 1.10 pm, but was delayed. I landed in Mumbai at 1.15 pm, and when I came out of the airport at 1.50 pm, I heard about the crash,” Milan told The Indian Express.

Milan Sharma and his family who have come from Vadodara to pay homage to his deceased sister Anju Sharma.

Anju, 56, was one of nine siblings — eight sisters and a brother. Their elderly parents live in Haryana. She lost her husband in 2021, and has two daughters: Nimmi, who lives in the UK, and Honey, who is in India.

Milan recalls having spoken to her on the flight. She had ordered a masala dosa but wasn’t in the mood to eat it. “Anju didi video-called our mother from the airport, but she could not pick up the call, and she regrets it to this day,” he says.

Mukesh Patni, who drives an autorickshaw, arrived to pay homage to his mother Jiviben, 68, whose poster hung outside the crash site.

“My mother lived in a small hut nearby. When the plane crashed, she was alone and cooking a meal. I learned about the crash on social media and immediately rushed, but my mother had died by then,” says Patni. “Today, I came to pay my respects to my mother and all others killed in the crash. We have received compensation, but we want to know the reason behind the crash. The investigation report is not out yet.”

Among the early visitors was British High Commissioner to India, Lindy Cameron, who laid a bouquet of flowers outside the closed gates and paid obeisance. Fifty-two British citizens died in the crash. The lone survivor, Vishwas Kumar Ramesh, was also a British citizen.

Former Gujarat chief minister Vijay Rupani’s daughter, Radhika Mishra, was also among the visitors, as she arrived to pay her respects at the site of her father’s death.

Family members of a victim grieving while remembering them on the crash site. (Express Photo By Bhupendra Rana)

Evening at the site

As the sun began to go down, the number of people at the site rose, as families streamed in with photographs, some garlanded, and placed them on the niche in the main wall, outside the gates.

While some families went to the mess building and laid flowers at a corner underneath the sight of the collapsed overhead tank, others, determined to say a prayer inside the premises, were led to the back of the hostels over a mound of sand to whisper their grief amid the charred cars and bikes in the parking lot.

By about 5.30 pm, a large number of families had gathered at the spot, with a pastor saying a prayer on one side of the gate. On the other side, in New Lakshminagar, preparations for the bhajan event had begun.

family members praying and paying homage to their lost loved ones at the crash site. (Express Photo By Bhupendra Rana)

An occasional wail cut through the solemn gathering as family members broke down. Some, visiting the place for the first time since the disaster, were trying to make sense of the scene as others who had been there last year explained it.

Outside the soot-covered mess building lay heaps of mattresses, burnt plastic tables and chairs, an intact mixer jar, a pan, and several everyday items.

Every hour, the sound of three to four planes flying overhead drowned out the heavy traffic, making some heads turn upwards. Around 1 pm, an Air India aircraft flew overhead, causing chatter among the gathered locals. “That day, it flew very low,” said a young boy from New Lakshminagar. The entrance to the locality still has a poster that says “Pradhan Mantri Aawas Yojana”, which features a photo of former chief minister Rupani.