Neeraj Tribune News Service Amritsar August 17 The mortal remains of Lt Col Abheet Singh Baath—pilot of the Rudra helicopter from the Army Aviation Squadron—were consigned to flames with full military honours at his native place Amritsar on Tuesday. With teary eyes people attended his funeral when his 13-year-old son who is an only child lit the pyre. He is survived by his aged mother wife and son while his brother resides abroad. Earlier his body was kept at his house in the Adarsh Nagar locality near the Cantonment where relatives friends and the residents paid homage to the departed soul. Exactly 13 days after the crash of his helicopter that his body was retrieved on August 15. It was on August 3 that he along with Captain Jayant Joshi had taken off from Mamun cantonment on a routine sortie but it had crashed into Jammu and Kashmirs Ranjit Sagar water reservoir which is about 25 km long eight km wide and more than 500 feet deep. The reservoir falls in Jammu and Kashmirs Kathua district and is about 30 km from Pathankot. The body of another pilot is yet to be spotted. The fatal crash ensued one of the longest search operations in recent history in which experts and types of equipment of not only Army Navy and Air Force but also of NDRF SDRF NGOs state police dam authority and private firms from across the country were deployed to locate the wreckage and retrieve the bodies. Stretched nearly to a fortnight the search operation saw even heavy machinery being flown into from different parts of the country. For instance the Navys submarine rescue unit was flown into digitally explore the wreckage and the IAF lifted heavy equipment for underwater search from Visakhapatnam. Specialised divers from the Navy and Armys Special Forces worked in tandem. It was only recently that the agencies involved in the search operation located the wreckage after they employed specialised machines including multi-beam sonars side scanners remotely operated vehicles and underwater manipulators flown in from Chandigarh Delhi Mumbai and Kochi informed sources involved in the search operation. They stated that the operation was challenging due to the near-zero visibility in the reservoir due to the colloidal nature of its water. Wreaths were laid and an army contingent presented the guard of honour at the crematorium. Apart from officials of the district administration MP Gurjeet Singh Aujla and councillor Vikas Soni were present during the cremation.

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