Families received wrong remains of Air India crash victims - lawyer

Relatives carry the coffin of a victim of the Air India flight crash during a funeral ceremony in Ahmedabad. Photo / Basit Zargar, AFP

Relatives of a British victim killed in last month’s Air India crash received a casket that contained mixed remains, a lawyer representing several families and UK media has said.

The family of a separate victim received the remains of another person, according to James Healy-Pratt, who is representing 20 British families who lost loved ones in the disaster.

A total of 241 people on board the London-bound Boeing 787 Dreamliner died when the plane crashed shortly after take-off from Ahmedabad in western India on June 12.

Some 169 Indian passengers and 52 British nationals were killed, making it one of the deadliest plane crashes in terms of the number of British fatalities.

Several people on the ground also died while only one passenger, British citizen Vishwash Kumar Ramesh, survived the crash.

Healy-Pratt told the Press Association news agency that the return of victims’ remains had been marred by serious errors, which had been identified following a probe by a British coroner.

“In the first two caskets that were repatriated, in one of the caskets, there was co-mingling of DNA which did not relate to the deceased in that casket or the casket that accompanied it,” he said.

The lawyer added the coroner was then “able to determine that one particular loved one was not at all who the family thought they were”.

Miten Patel, whose mother Shobhana Patel died with her husband in the disaster, told the BBC that “other remains” were found in her casket after her body was returned to Britain.

“People were tired and there was a lot of pressure. But there has to be a level of responsibility that you’re sending the right bodies to the UK,” he told the broadcaster.

The Daily Mail newspaper first reported two cases in which the wrong remains were apparently returned to families in Britain.

India’s foreign ministry said all remains “were handled with utmost professionalism and with due regard for the dignity of the deceased”.

“We are continuing to work with the UK authorities on addressing any concerns related to this issue,” the statement added.

- Agence France-Presse