JOIN USThe mortal remains of Captain Rajeev Hoskote (28), the co-pilot of the ill-fated helicopter that crashed in Arunachal Pradesh on August 4, will be cremated in his hometown Mysuru on Friday.
According to a relative of Rajeev, the body will be consigned to flames at the MCC crematorium near the foot of the Chamundi Hill.
On Thursday, the body was airlifted from Arunachal Pradesh and it reached Bengaluru at around 8.30 pm. The body was later brought to Mysuru by road late in the night. Rajeev’s parents Manjunath and Vanishri, brother Rakshith and sister Ramya (twins) and other relatives accompanied the body.
The body will be kept at his house on Ramanuja Road, near the Mysore Palace, to enable his relatives and friends pay their last respects. The cremation will be conducted at 8 am. The neighbours were a depressed lot, after hearing the news of Rajeev’s death.
Rajeev, the eldest of three siblings, was among the three occupants of the chopper belonging to Pawan Hans company that went missing in Arunachal Pradesh. Captain M S Brar was manoeuvring the aircraft, with Rajeev Hoskote as his deputy and the Deputy Commissioner of Tirap district Kamalesh Kumar Joshi on board. All the three were killed in the mishap.
The search for the remains of the chopper and its occupants ended on Wednesday, with the locals and Army personnel succeeding in tracing the debris in a 400-foot gorge between Pongkong and Longliang villages in Arunachal Pradesh, bordering Myanmar. After much efforts, the bodies were retrieved.