Kathmandu, Jan 22 (PTI) Nepal’s health officials on Sunday identified two more bodies of the Indian nationals who died in a plane crash in Pokhara and assured the victims’ relatives that they will be handed over all four bodies on Monday.
Nepalese authorities on Tuesday started handing over to family members the bodies of those killed in the January 14 crash of a Yeti Airlines passenger plane with 72 people on board.
Fifty-three Nepalese passengers and 15 foreign nationals, including 5 Indians, and four crew members were on board the aircraft when it crashed in a river gorge in the resort city of Pokhara.
The five Indians, all reportedly from Uttar Pradesh, have been identified as Abhisekh Kushwaha, 25, Bishal Sharma, 22, Anil Kumar Rajbhar, 27, Sonu Jaiswal, 35, and Sanjaya Jaiswal.
The doctors at Tribhuvan University Teaching Hospital have completed postmortem of all the bodies they received. Barring 12 bodies, the rest have been identified by the doctors.
The doctors on Sunday identified two more dead bodies of the Indian nationals.
They identified the bodies of Anil Kumar Rajbhar and Abhisehk Kushwaha on the basis of evidence provided by the kins of the victims, according to hospital sources.
Earlier, on Saturday the body of Sharma was identified. On Friday, the body of Sanjaya Jaiswal was handed over to his family who took it back to India.
The only remaining body yet to be identified is that of Sonu.
Vijaya Jaishwal, elder brother of Sonu, and Rajendra Prasad Jaiswal, Sonu’s father, waited at the hospital on Sunday to receive the body.
Other relatives present at the hospital were Ramdras Rajbhar, father of Anil, Abhinesh Kushwaha, younger brother of Abhisekh and Vishwojit Sharma, younger brother of Bishal.
The relatives of four Indian nationals have been waiting for four days to receive the dead bodies of their kin.
One of the relatives said on Saturday they want to take back all four bodies of the Indians in a single consignment.
The doctors at the hospital on Sunday assured the kins of the Indian victims that they were trying to verify the body of Sonu with the signs provided by the family and will most probably hand over all four bodies to relatives on Monday, one of the relatives told PTI.
Meanwhile, the Nepal Army said on Sunday it continued its search operation at the Seti River gorge and the surrounding areas to find the remaining one body and will resume it on Monday.
So far, only 71 dead bodies have been recovered.
According to Nepal’s civil aviation body, 914 people have died in air crashes in the country since the first disaster was recorded in August 1955.
The Yeti Airlines tragedy in Pokhara on January 14 was the 104th crash in Nepali skies and the third biggest in terms of casualties. PTI SBP MRJ
