Navy officer from Odisha goes ‘missing’ while heading to Kochi unit, police say seen on CCTV

According to his mother, he called her at 3:50 am –- after he had boarded his train –- and asked her not to get worried.

“When I called him again at around 8:30 am, his phone was switched off. We tried to call him, but it remained turned off. Since he had to take the 12:30 pm flight from Visakhapatnam, we checked with airport authorities there but they told us that that he had not checked in,” she said, adding that the family reached out to his Naval unit in Kochi, the INS Garuda, to help locate him.

She approached the Town Police station in Berhampur Wednesday based on which police registered a case and launched an investigation.

Berhampur SP Saravana Vivek M told The Indian Express that CCTV images show he got off the train at Ichchapuram in Andhra Pradesh’s Srikakulam district and took an auto rickshaw “instead of going to Visakhapatnam”.

“He also left his personal tablet, which he always carries, at home,” he said.

The man was recently posted at the INS Garuda. He came home in December to attend a wedding.

His younger brother urged authorities to take up the case on priority. “My brother is serving the nation. So, our request to the authorities to take up the case with top priority,” he said. He also denied his brother had “any animosity”, saying: “His behaviour was also absolutely normal as he had come to attend a marriage function of a relative.”