Bangalore, April 17
Thirtytwo-year-old South Indian actress Soundarya was among four persons killed in a plane crash here today. The craft crashed on barren land on Gandhi Krishi Vigyan Kendra (GKVK) campus of the University of Agricultural Sciences in northern Bangalore.

The small four-seater Cessna E180, chartered from the locally-based Agni Aviation, was on a BJP campaign trip headed for Karim Nagar in Andhra Pradesh. The others killed are the pilot John Philip, the actress’s brother Amarnath, and BJP worker Ramesh Kadam.

Relating eyewitness accounts, Union Minister and BJP General Secretary for Karnataka Affairs Arun Jaitley told reporters at the site of the crash that it appeared that the aircraft “lost balance” after take off at around 11 a.m. and fell on the ground. When people rushed to offer help and remove the bodies, the aircraft caught fire, he said.

The bodies were fully burnt, and the police had a difficult time extricating them. It was only at around 1.30 p.m. that the bodies were removed and taken to a hospital in an ambulance.

“Soundarya had a fine career ahead of her, which has been cut short. Ramesh Kadam was looking after publicity and related activities for the party. Our condolences go out to the family of those killed.”

BJP state leader Ananth Kumar added that it was great tragedy “not only for the family of the deceased, but to the people of Karnataka, the film industry, and the BJP.”

Soundarya, whose real name was Sowmya, was the daughter of Kannada film producer and director Sathyanarayana. She had acted in several Kannada, Telugu, Malayalam and Tamil films, and co-starred with Amitabh Bachchan in Hindi film “Suryavamsham”. She also won a national award for production last year, for Kannada film “Dweepa”, directed by Girish Kasaravalli, which was screened at several international festivals. She was married in April, 2003, to software professional.

Karnataka Chief Minister S.M. Krishna also visited the site and expressed his condolences. He directed officials to offer all assistance possible. Police Commissioner C. Mariswamy told reporters that the Directorate-General of Civil Aviation (DGCA) had already taken up the investigation into the cause of the crash.

Agni Aviation belongs to Mr Arvind Sharma, son of an IAS officer. His operation is based in Jakkur, a small airfield to the north of the GKVK campus on the Bangalore-Hyderabad highway, which also houses Government Flight Training School.