The Maharashtra government has decided to accord a state funeral to Captain Deepak Sathe, pilot-in-command of the ill-fated Air India Express plane that crashed in Kerala last week, Chief Minister Uddhav Thackeray's Office said on Tuesday. The funeral of Captain Sathe, 58, was a resident of Chandivali in Mumbai.
Lauding Sathe, the Chief Minister's Office (CMO) said his life shall inspire young pilots to achieve the 'Sword of Honour'. The Air India Express flight from Dubai with 190 people, including a six-member crew, overshot the tabletop runway during landing at the Kozhikode airport in heavy rain on Friday, fell into a valley 35 feet below and broke into two, killing 18 people, including both pilots.
"The state has decided to accord a state funeral to the late Wing Commander (Retd) Captain DV Sathe. His life has been one that shall inspire many more young pilots to achieve the Sword of Honour and command over the skies," the CMO tweeted.
After the plane crash, Sathe's wife Sushma and one of their sons had gone to Kerala to collect his mortal remains, which were brought in a flight on Sunday. The body was then kept at the Air India facility near Terminal 2 of the Chhatrapati Shivaji international airport for some time before being taken to Bhabha Hospital.
Sathe was a former Wing Commander of the Indian Air Force (IAF) and had served at the force's flight testing establishment. He survived an air crash in the early 1990s when he was in the Air Force and was hospitalised for six months, his cousin earlier said. Sathe had suffered multiple injuries on his skull in that incident, but due to his strong will power and passion he cleared the test and started flying again, he said. Captain Sathe's father Brigadier Vasant Sathe (retired) and his wife live in Nagpur.