Viswashkumar Ramesh, 40, the sole survivor of Air India Flight 171, is among the ranks of those spared by fate.

An Air India plane crashed Thursday near a major international airport in the western Indian city of Ahmedabad, the airline and the country’s government said.

Just days after his wife, Bharatiben, succumbed to cancer, Arjun Patoliya visited their native Gujarat village in India last week to fulfill her dying wish of being laid to rest there.

Air India Flight 171 was “involved in a tragic accident,” the airline’s chairman said. The plane was due to fly from Ahmedabad to London’s Gatwick Airport.

A father of two who had traveled from the U.K. to India to spread his wife's ashes died in the Air India crash on June 12, leaving the couple's two daughters, ages 4 and 8, orphaned. Arjun Patoliya, 37,

On June 12, as news emerged that an Air India flight bound for London crashed shortly after takeoff in Ahmedabad, India, a video ( archived) circulated online claiming to authentically show the final moments before the crash from inside the cabin.

News of the sole survivor of an Air India plane crash that killed the other 241 people aboard has led to endless fascination online.

Air India on Saturday announced that it will provide an interim payment of Rs 25 lakh each to the families of the passengers who lost their lives in the Ahmedabad plane crash. "As part of our continued efforts,

Vishwaskumar Ramesh, the only survivor of the Air India plane crash in Ahmedabad, India, said he "thought I would die" as he recovers in hospital.

Chaired by Union Home Secretary Govind Mohan, the panel has the civil aviation secretary and the additional secretary in the home ministry as members, according to an order dated June 13.