THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: V. P. Sahadevan, the father of Flight Lieutenant S. Achu Dev who was killed in the Sukhoi-30 air crash at Tezpur on May 23, is dejected that the court of enquiry is getting delayed. He recalled an incident where another flight lieutenant Anshu, a UP native, was able to eject from the Sukhoi-30 when it crashed into the Brahmaputra. The peeved father said the court of enquiry into this mishap is yet to be made public by the Air Force which had happened in 2015 May.
Anshu had accompanied Achu Dev's empty coffin to Thiruvananthapuram and later to Kozhikode. Four days after Mr Sahadevan and mother Jayashree, forwarded a complaint to President, Prime Minister and Union defence minister, they are yet to get any feedback from the concerned authorities on the reason that led to their son’s death. Sahadevan told DC that the Air Force officials who had accompanied the coffin of Achu Dev were merely concerned about discharging their duties as per protocol.
“Unfortunately we are yet to hear from the authorities after we had shot off three letters via Attingal MP A. Sampath. I am following it up, but I doubt whether we will get justice. At the same time, I am also apprehensive on the findings being unearthed by the court of enquiry which I do not know when it would be released,” said Mr Sahadevan, a retired Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre engineer who resides at Pongumoodu in the city.
He also cast serious aspersions on Russians, the makers of Sukhoi -30, who had already tampered with the software of the black box of the aircraft flown by Achu Dev and Squadron Leader Divesh Pankaj which crashed on the Arunachal Pradesh border. “Unfortunately, I don’t have proof to show that the Russians had tampered with the software. They have got the technology to do that,”he added.
