Tributes paid to Mangaluru air crash victims on 10th anniversary

Kin of the victims of 2010 Mangaluru air crash along with the district administration and police personnel paid homage at the memorial site of one of India's worst aviation disaster on Friday.

Mangaluru: The victims of 2010 Mangaluru air crash were remembered on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of the aviation disaster with district administration paying obeisance at the memorial site on Friday.

According to the reports, Dakshina Kannada district in-charge Minister Kota Shrinivasa Pujari, MP Nalin Kumar Katil, DC Sindhu B Roopesh, and employees of the airport were in attendance. They offered a floral tribute besides observing a two-minute silence.

One of the country's worst aviation disasters, Air India Express flight IX 812, an early morning flight from Dubai while landing at the airport overshot the runway and crashed into a deep gorge nearby.

The flight went up in flames in a few minutes. 158 persons including two pilots and four cabin crew members died in the accident. Among the deceased, 135 were adults, 19 were children and four were toddlers. Identity of 12 victims was not confirmed and their final rites were performed by the district administration near Kulur bridge on Kulur-Tannir Bavi road.

Even a decade later, relatives of the victims allege injustice in the distribution of compensation.

"A few got compensation of Rs.35 lakhs while some others got up to Rs.7 crores," sources say.

Though relief amount was fixed on the basis of the income of the deceased and their age, it is alleged that different parameters were followed while releasing the compensation.

Further, a memorial was built in the memory of the deceased at the spot of the crash by then DC AB Ibrahim at an estimated cost of Rs.10 lakhs.