Mumbai: When Mumbai police personnel today contacted the elder sister of Vaibhavi (Bandekar) Tripathi, who was on board the plane that went missing in Nepal earlier in the day, she requested them not to tell anything about the incident to her mother, saying she was already in a critical condition, an official said.
Vaibhavi Tripathi, her husband Ashok Kumar Tripathi and their children - Dhanush and Ritika - were residents of Thane city adjoining Mumbai, and along with 18 others were travelling on the Tara Air plane that crashed in the mountains of Nepal. All onboard are confirmed to have been killed, with sixteen bodies recovered so far.
"Following the incident, the Indian Embassy in Nepal contacted the Mumbai police asking them to find the residence of the four family members who were on board the plane, and inform the relatives about it. Accordingly, a team of the Borivali police station got in touch with one Seema Prabhu, who resides in Vaibhavi (Bandekar) Tripathi's housing society. She gave Vaibhavi's elder sister Sanjeevani Sadani's contact number, who lives with her mother in Thane," an official said.
"The police contacted Vaibhavi's sister and shared the information with her. But she told our personnel that she had already got in touch with the Indian embassy in Nepal. She then requested the police not to tell anything about the incident to her mother as her health condition is critical," he added.
The official said that the address mentioned on Vaibhavi's passport said she is a resident of Bhushan Park View Society at Chikuwadi in Borivali. But when the police team went to that place, it was found that the flat had been rented out, he said.
Later, the police team found out that the Tripathi family currently resides in Thane city and their house is located in the area under the jurisdiction of Kapurbawdi police station, while Sadani lives with her mother in A nearby area, the police official said.
The Twin Otter 9N-AET plane belonging to Tara Air took off at 10:15 am from Pokhara, and lost contact with the control tower 15 minutes later. The plane was later spotted in a state of burning at Laningchgola, an upper area of Larikota in Thasang Rural Municipality-2 in Mustang district.
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