With 260+ dead and counting, Air India crash site sees a year's footfall in single day, and the crowd keeps growing

The young boys wore a sombre look. This wasn't a night like any other, they too weren't the same boys of regular nights. One of them stepped forward and gestured the car to stop. Other one checked credentials and asked the car to go back.

"You can't go further, sir," he says politely as the white sedan turns around. To some other cars he allows to cross the first barricade and shows a place to park. "You have to walk from here on," he says.

About couple of hundred meters away, charred buildings of BJ Medical College and wreckage of the ill fated plane tries hiding their ugly scars for a bit before dawn reveals it to the world with a vengeance. The narrow lanes leading to them are strewn with discarded gloves, plastic bottles and pieces of burnt debris.


With more than 260 people dead and counting, the area has seen more footfall in day that it does in a year and more are on the way.

As a senior lady police officer comes screaming at prying eyes still trying to see a thing or two unseen by the rest so far, a constable close to his retirement shakes his head. "Never thought I shall have to see something like this in my life," he mutters under his breath. The wail of ambulance sirens have fallen silent for the night. "Almost all bodies are recovered now, the NDRF team is going back," says another policeman as the orange buses turn around with the tired men inside.

Back in Civil Hospital, some of the relatives of the victims sit around in clusters. A sharp wail punctures the eerie night's thick stench of death. Behind the trauma centre, a dog wags its tail as some newsmen try to sneak a pick into the rooms filled with the charred dead bodies. Inside, medical professionals move on from one to another body picking up marks of identity, samples of DNA.

Meanwhile uniformed volunteers of RSS strut around enforcing discipline among the idle watchers and empty space alike, wielding their sticks to chilling effect. "Are you a relative of a passenger? Let me guide you to the place where they are collecting DNA," offers a young boy holding a stick.

Some other bearded one threatens a journalist to check the mobile phone for any appropriate photographs taken in the course of his work. All for the love of country and people.

Outside the main gate of the hospital a tea seller starts making his first lot of tea for the day. It is 3.30 in the morning now.