At Ahmedabad College Where Air India Plane Crashed, Time Still Stopped A Year On

The scars left behind by the wreckage of the Air India Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner that crashed seconds after takeoff in Ahmedabad on June 12 last year are yet to be fully healed. The medical college hostel on which the massive aircraft fell after losing thrust stands as a skeletal concrete structure, soot clearly visible on the walls scarred by high-intensity aviation fuel fire.

The investigation into the crash is still going on and the final report is awaited, though an initial report has come. It will be a year tomorrow since the plane crash that killed 260, including people on the ground. Questions over pilot action, technical failure and the fuel cutoff switch theory continue to linger as families wait for closure. The efforts for ensuring compensation and fixing liabilities continue.

Will the Aircraft Accident Investigation Bureau (AAIB) release its final report, or will another interim update come first?

Twelve months after the aviation accident, NDTV returned to the crash site where memories of that horrific day continue to haunt survivors, families and an entire community. The crash killed 19 students and staff of the medical college hostel. Parts of the kitchen and the dining area still bear signs of the impact - the benches and the dining area where MBBS students used to come for meals.

The Gujarat government has announced reconstruction and redevelopment plans that would demolish the damaged structures and build a new one with all the modern facilities.

"A new hostel will be built at the crash site location," state Health Minister Praful Chhaganbhai Pansheriya told NDTV.

NDTV spoke to Rushabh Rupani, the son of former chief minister Vijay Rupani, who died in the crash. Rushabh Rupani recalled the tragic day, where he was and how he came to know about the crash.

"People should trust the government and investigative agencies. They will do justice in the matter," he said.

A woman and her daughter told NDTV how they saw in horror the Air India plane going down near the airport. Her 14-year-old son was killed on the ground. Seetaben and her daughter Kajalben ran a tea shop. She last saw her son, Akash, walking before the plane's debris fell on him.

"My son brought afternoon tiffin for me, and I had asked him to rest for sometime. That is when the plane crashed and part of the wing fell on him, killing him," Seetaben, who had been running a tea stall opposite the hostel for 20 years, told NDTV. She, too, suffered burn injuries.

At the hostel, an eyewitness returns and stares at the wall stained with soot.

"I can't describe what I saw that day. It is something that will haunt me forever," Nareshbhai Patel, the eyewitness, told NDTV at the medical college hostel.

The emotional weight of the tragedy is most painfully felt in the enduring grief of the survivors and the families left behind, who are forced to navigate a world without their family members.

#Prime5 with @SehgalRahesha | 1 Year After AI-171 Crash, Mystery Deepens, No Final Report Yet @saurabhv99 reports pic.twitter.com/duaAlRxSzH

— NDTV (@ndtv) June 11, 2026

For them, the last 12 months have not healed the wounds, but have instead been a slow, agonising process of facing empty chairs in their living and dining rooms and unanswered questions.

Inside the damaged hostel building, everyday kitchen items like plates still remain exactly as they were left on the day of the disaster.

In Diu, from where 14 residents were killed in the crash, NDTV met families whose wounds are yet to heal.

Faizan Rafiq, who died in the crash, is survived by his maternal grandfather Suleman Ibrahim. The elderly man said that even today, he tears up several times a day at the mere memory of Faizan. The family is completely shattered, both financially and mentally.

More scenes of extreme sadness and pain were visible in the house of a family in Diu whose four members were killed in the crash. They were Girishbhai Jethwa, wife Hemakshi Jethwa, son Aadiv Jethwa and daughter Takshvi Jethwa.

His brother Mahendra Jethwa told NDTV the family had come to Diu to spend their holidays and had just taken off for the return flight to the UK.

Since the crash, Air India has been focussing on the mental health of its staff as investigators look closely at human factors which may have resulted in the crash.

Public speculation heavily fueled by early leaks and Western media reports has pointed toward a potential pilot-induced event. Addressing this critical intersection of human performance and tragedy, Air India has heavily reinforced its training and psychological support structures.

This includes a comprehensive training and mental health framework integrated under its Human Factors Charter designed to be "proactive, preventive, and non-punitive." While the Human Factors Charter began prior to the crash of AI-172, the focus on mental health issues has intensified dramatically over the last year.