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The only passenger to have survived the crash of Air India Flight 171 in June says he’s the ‘luckiest man’ alive.
Yet Viswashkumar Ramesh admits that, some days in the four months since the crash, he feels anything but.
Ramesh was flying back to London from Ahmedabad, India, when the plane crashed moments after taking off, killing the 241 other people on board the Boeing 787 Dreamliner. Among them was his brother, Ajay.
Experts previously told Metro that between the crash, the fire and the smoke, escape was impossible.
But Ramesh did just that, with footage going viral of him limping towards an ambulance, his face and shirt covered in blood.
‘I’m only one survivor. Still, I’m not believing. It’s a miracle,’ Ramesh told the BBC from his family home in Leicester.
‘I lost my brother as well. My brother is my backbone. Last few years, he was always supporting me.
Ramesh said that, as much as he feels he’s the ‘luckiest man’ on Earth, he has post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and struggles to speak.
He said: ‘Now I’m alone. I just sit in my room alone, not talking with my wife, my son. I just like to be alone in my house.’
He added: ‘I’m not talking to anyone else. I do not like to talk with anyone else.
‘I can’t talk about much. I’m thinking all night, I’m suffering mentally. Every day is painful for the whole family.’
Asked about the crash – one that Indian aviation officials said was due to the fuel supply cutting off – he said: ‘I can’t say anything about that now.’
He previously told India’s DD News how he was seated in exit row 11A and felt the plane was ‘stuck’ for 10 seconds after takeoff before crashing within 32 seconds.
The front of the plane, after hitting buildings, crashed into an open area, with the tail wedging into the canteen of a medical college.
Ramesh, who was returning to England after going on holiday with his brother, unbuckled his seat following the crash and escaped.
Ramesh still suffers with pain in his leg, shoulder, knee and back and has not been able to work or drive since the crash.
Air India offered Ramesh £21,500 in compensation, but advisors said this is not nearly enough to meet his needs.
The Ramesh family business in Diu, a town in western India, has collapsed.
Air India told the BBC that an ‘offer’ was made to the Ramesh family to arrange a meeting with senior airline staff.
‘We will continue to reach out and we very much hope to receive a positive response,’ it added.
Radd Seiger, a spokesman for the family, however, claimed that they have reached out to Air India several times, only to be ‘ignored or turned down’.
‘The people who should be sitting here today are the executives of Air India,’ Seiger added, ‘the people responsible for trying to put things right.’
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