By IANS
Chandigarh : The Indian Army has recovered the mortal remains of three of its men after 39 years from the inhospitable and snowy heights of Lahaul Valley in Himachal Pradesh.
These three soldiers were among the 102 people who perished in a crash of an AN-12 transport aircraft of the Indian Air Force (IAF) on Feb 7, 1968. All on board, including the IAF crew, were killed in the crash.
The mortal remains recovered Thursday were Friday brought here by helicopters.
The remains were recovered by an expedition led by Major Nishant Kumar of the Dogra Scouts after a detailed search of the crash site at a height of nearly 17,500 feet. The expedition, code named Operation Punaruthan-III, was launched Aug 2 and took five days to locate the wreckage site.
An army spokesman at the Western Command here said that after identification, the bodies recovered would be handed over to the relatives and cremated with full military honours.
The aircraft had taken off from Chandigarh airport and was headed to Leh when it got caught in bad weather over Lahaul and Spiti valleys in Himachal Pradesh and hit the towering 6,264-metre-high Chandrabhaga peak.
The aircraft was declared missing as even its wreckage could not be spotted.
The wreckage of the aircraft was found only in 2003 by an expedition of the Institute of Mountaineering and Allied Sports, Manali. This team also recovered the mortal remains of a soldier named Beli Ram. He was cremated with full military honours 35 years after his death in the crash.
The army had been sending expeditions to the peak every summer since 2004 to recover bodies of the crash victims. Families of many of these victims have been waiting for recovery of the bodies to perform the last rites.
The Russian-made AN-12 transport aircraft were phased out of the IAF fleet several years ago.