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Video Editor: Purnendu Pritam
21-year-old Sumedha, lost her father Captain Amitesh Prasad to COVID-19 on 9 May. Her dad was an Air India Pilot for almost 15 years. He tested COVID-19 positive after he returned to India on a flight from San Francisco on 15 April 2021.
Prasad started showing COVID-19 symptoms soon after landing. Initially, he quarantined himself and later got admitted to a hospital.
Sumedha added that her father was "somehow not wanting to go on the San Francisco flight on which he contracted COVID-19" which was very unlike him. "Maybe his inner instinct kicked in," she said.
Sumedha conceded there was a bit of resistance from the family in letting Captain Prasad fly on the Vande Bharat mission flights when Air India started them in May 2020.
Sumedha thought that like many others her father will be able to recover from the disease even if he got infected with COVID-19.
Captain Prasad did not get even a single dose of vaccine, Sumedha told The Quint.
Between 9 and 14 May, Air India lost three pilots to COVID-19, Captain Amitesh Prasad, Captain Sandeep Rana and Captain GPS Gill.
ironically, the Indian Pilots' Guild had written multiple letters in April 2021 to the Health Minister Harsh Vardhan and to the Air India's Chairman and Managing Director, requesting them to start in-house vaccination for Air India crew members.
Air India started vaccination drives for its crew members on 15 May, six days after Captain Prasad died.
Air India announced Rs 10 lakh as compensation for the family of each of the pilots who died due to COVID-19. But the Indian Pilots' Guild has demanded higher compensation for the deceased pilots families in a letter to Air India sent on 22 May 2021.
The Guild also pointed out in the letter that the Maharashtra and Delhi governments are paying Rs 50 lakh and Rs 1 crore respectively, to the families of frontline workers killed by COVID-19.
Captain Prasad's wife is a homemaker, while Sumedha got her first job in Canada on the same day that she lost her father.
Sumedha says her father had promised to give her a lot of advice when she got her first job, but knows that will not happen now. She adds that she will miss her father at the various milestones of her life.
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