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Worst fears come true, YSR dead
Hyderabad, September 3 "The chopper was in bits and pieces, strewn all over the hillock. The bodies were charred and in a state of decomposition,” the Chief Secretary P Ramakanth Reddy told reporters. The helicopter, which had left Hyderabad at 8.30 am yesterday and lost radio contact an hour later, hit the cliff of the hillock, crashed into it and exploded. "It appears that because of inclement weather and to avoid cloud formation, the pilot had taken a detour and in the process deviated about 18 km from the regular flight path,” the Chief Secretary said. The bodies were shifted to Kurnool where post-mortem was conducted. They were then airlifted to the city. As a pall of gloom descended on the state with a large number of grief-stricken people pouring on to the streets, the Chief Minister’s body was brought to his official residence here in a IAF helicopter. The shocked family and relatives of the Chief Minister gathered around the coffin and wept inconsolably. The body will be kept at L B Stadium here tomorrow for about four hours to enable people to pay their last respects, the Finance Minister K Rosaiah said. The funeral will be held at his home town Pulivendula in Kadapa district tomorrow with full state honours. The Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, UPA Chairperson Sonia Gandhi, Rahul Gandhi and several union ministers will arrive here tomorrow to pay homage to the departed leader. The state cabinet held a meeting and adopted a resolution condoling the untimely death of the Chief Minister. The government has declared a seven-day mourning. As the tragic news about YSR’s death trickled in, a pall of gloom descended on the state with wailing supporters of Chief Minister pouring in at his residence, the secretariat and the camp office.
“Initially three bodies were traced and then the fourth one. It took a while to locate the fifth body. We have identified the bodies from the dresses they were wearing,” the Director General of Police S S P Yadav said. Unprecedented search operations by army, Air Force, paramilitary force and the state police were launched even since the helicopter lost radio contact with the Air Traffic Control at 9.30 am yesterday. “We found the helicopter at the top of a hill, about 40 nautical miles east of Kurnool,” the Air Commodore V S Bharti, who was coordinating the rescue mission, told reporters this morning. About 30 minutes later, three IAF choppers circled around the wreckage site and located the mangled chopper. The Chief Minister left Hyderabad yesterday at 8.30 am for Chittoor to launch the mass contact programme “Raccha Banda”. An hour later, the chopper lost contact with the ATC while flying over Nallamala forest area in bad weather. Soon after the chopper lost contact, multiple agencies, including Army and IAF, launched the country’s biggest ever search operation with satellites in the sky joining the remote-sensing aircraft, fighter jets, unmanned aerial vehicles and over 2,000 troops on the ground. The leaders from across the political spectrum expressed shock and grief over the untimely death of YSR. “I have lost a personal friend. YSR was a man of masses and had earned their love and affection. He was dedicated to the development of the state. His demise is a great loss not only to Congress but to the entire state,” the TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu said. The PRP chief Chiranjeevi condoled the death of Chief Minister and said he would remain forever in the hearts of the people because of the welfare measures he had undertaken. The Union Ministers Veerappa Moily and Prithviraj Chouhan, who were deputed by Sonia Gandhi to oversee the search operations, also expressed shock over the tragedy.
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Outpouring of grief Hyderabad, September 3 A pall of gloom descended upon the State Secretariat and Gandhi Bhavan - the state Congress headquarters - as the death of the Chief Minister and four others was officially announced. Several Congress leaders broke down on hearing the news. While sharing the details of funeral arrangements with the media, Finance Minister K Rosaiah could not control his tears. He said several of his colleagues were in a state of deep shock. Poignant scenes were witnessed at “Samatha” block in Secretariat which houses the Chief Minister’s Office. A large number of ministers, legislators and senior Congress leaders huddled together and were seen consoling each other. Medical and Health Minister Danam Nagender, AP Mahila Congress party president K Ganga Bhavani, MLA Jogu Ramesh, State Information Commissioner Sudhakar Rao and others could not control their emotions. A close aide of Chief Minister and Rajya Sabha member KVP Ramachandra Rao and others hurriedly left secretariat soon after getting information that the wreckage of the helicopter was found in Nallamala forest. A pall of gloom descended on the Vijayanagar colony residence of ASC Wesley, chief security officer of the Chief Minister, who also perished in the mishap. Visitors started streaming in since morning as soon as the chopper in which he travelled along with the Chief Minister was traced and the deaths were announced. The 44-year-old Wesley hailed from Ongole and was inducted into the IPS in 1998. He is survived by wife and two children.
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Except the tail portion, the body of the helicoper of the AP Aviation Corporation was reduced to pieces in the mishap. It crashed 10 km away from Rudrakoduru on a hostile terrain and army commandos had to slither down with the help of a rope from a rescue helicopter of the IAF.