[kellyhound]

A tragic aircraft crash occurred in the Naxalite-affected district of Balaghat in Madhya Pradesh, claiming the lives of a flight instructor and a female trainee pilot. The incident took place on Saturday, when a trainer aircraft belonging to the Indira Gandhi Rashtriya Uran Akademi crashed during a training sortie due to bad weather.

The aircraft took off from the Birsi airstrip in the neighboring Gondia district of Maharashtra and lost contact with Air Traffic Control shortly after. It crashed in the hilly region near Bhukkutola village in Balaghat district around 3:30 pm. The two victims were identified as flight instructor Captain Mohit Thakur, approximately 25 years old, and trainee pilot Vrikshanka Maheshwari, around 20 years old. Both bodies were recovered from the crash site, badly burnt, and were located about 40 km from the Balaghat district headquarters, in the mountains of Lanji and Kirnapur areas.