Family calls on PMO to get son’s body back

The bereaved family of deceased Palash Balsetwar (20) from Aurangabad has called on the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) and external affairs minister Sushma Swaraj over the delay in bringing back their son’s dead body from Iran.

Palash worked as deck cadet for a private shipping company and lost his life owing to his ship sinking late at night on March 15. M.V. Mashhour, a cargo ship, which met with an accident, is said to have been built way back in 1986. Palash’s father, Dutta Balsetwar, has lost all hopes of getting back his son’s body.

“I have been in constant touch with officials from the Iranian government and the Indian High Commission located in Tehran, Iran, for the past three days. They have not helped me with anything and have only given me assurance of sending the body only after 20 days, as it is vacation time in Iran,” he said.

Palash’s dead body is lying in a hospital in Iran and the agency, which fetched him a job with the shipping company, is not responding.

“Following the incident, my wife and daughter had to be admitted to a hospital in Aurangabad because of nervous breakdown,” said Mr Balsetwar.

Palash last touched base with his family via video conferencing the evening of March 15 when he said everything was fine and he was getting ready to board the ship.

“In the night, the captain of the ship is said to have applied sudden brakes for changing direction, due to which, the ship, being an old one, started sinking. It was my son who alerted others to get out of the ship and today, he is not present among us,” said Mr Dutta.

The family came to know about Palash's death only on March 17 when they came across a Facebook post of Palash's colleague which read, “Please share this post as much as you can and inform his (Palash’s) parents that he is no more and no authority is helping me here in Iran to get back to India.”

The family also tweeted to Prime Minister and Sushma Swaraj's Twitter handle, after which, the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) got into action. An official involved in the process of getting the dead body back, on condition of anonymity, said, “Iranian holidays are till April 04, 2016, which is hurting the pace of work. However, Ms Swaraj is closely monitoring the matter and we have been given instructions to get back the dead body as soon as possible. “

Palash dreamt of becoming captain of a cargo ship and had taken training from a private institute in Mumbai, where he had given an in-house interview but did not land any job. Later in November 2015, he came in contact with an agent, who, after taking his interview, sent him to Iran on December 24, 2015.

“The agent is also absconding after the incident and despite numerous phone calls to him, he has said he cannot do anything. Our only request to the government is to get back the body of my only son” said Mr Dutta.