Air India Dreamliner crashes into Ahmedabad college hostel, kills over 290
The dead included people on the ground as the aircraft - headed for Gatwick Airport, south of the British capital - crashed on to a medical college hostel during lunch hour.
At least one passenger is known to have survived, police said, and the man told Indian media how he had heard a loud noise shortly after take-off.
'Approximately 294 have died. This includes some students as the plane crashed on the building where they were staying,' Vidhi Chaudhary, a top state police officer, told Reuters.
She said police found one survivor who was in seat 11A, next to an emergency exit, adding that there could be more survivors in hospital.
'Thirty seconds after take-off, there was a loud noise and then the plane crashed,' 40-year-old Ramesh Viswashkumar told the Hindustan Times, which showed a boarding pass for seat 11A in that name online.
Five Indian aircraft shot down
'It all happened so quickly,' he told the paper from his hospital bed.
'When I got up, there were bodies all around me. I was scared. I stood up and ran. There were pieces of the plane all around me,' he said. 'Someone grabbed hold of me and put me in an ambulance and brought me to the hospital.'
He said that his brother, Ajay, was seated in a different row on the plane. 'He was travelling with me and I can't find him anymore. Please help me find him,' he said.
Ahmedabad police chief G.S. Malik said the bodies recovered could include both passengers and people killed on the ground. The dead included Vijay Rupani, the former chief minister of Gujarat state, of which Ahmedabad is the main city.
Relatives had been asked to give DNA samples to identify the dead, state health secretary Dhananjay Dwivedi told reporters.
Boeing shares fall 8% after Air India plane crashes
Parts of the plane's body were scattered around the smouldering building into which it crashed. The tail of the plane was stuck on top of the building.
The passengers included 217 adults, 11 children and two infants, a source told Reuters. Air India said 169 were Indian nationals, 53 were Britons, seven Portuguese, and one Canadian.
Aviation tracking site Flightradar24 said the plane was a Boeing 787-8 Dreamliner, one of the most modern passenger aircraft in service.
It was the first crash for the Dreamliner, which began flying commercially in 2011, according to the Aviation Safety Network database. The plane that crashed on Thursday flew for the first time in 2013 and was delivered to Air India in January 2014, Flightradar24 said.
Crash just after take-off
Thursday's crash occurred just after the plane took off. TV channels showed the plane taking off over a residential area and then disappearing from the screen before a huge fireball could be seen rising into the sky from beyond the houses.
'My sister-in-law was going to London. Within an hour, I got news that the plane had crashed,' Poonam Patel, a relative of one of the passengers, told news agency ANI at the government hospital in Ahmedabad.
Ramila, the mother of a student at the medical college, told ANI her son had gone to the hostel for his lunch break when the plane crashed. 'My son is safe, and I have spoken to him. He jumped from the second floor, so he suffered some injuries,' she said.
According to air traffic control at Ahmedabad Airport, the aircraft departed at 1:39 p.m. (0809 GMT). It gave a Mayday call, signalling an emergency, but thereafter there was no response from the aircraft.
U.S. aerospace safety consultant Anthony Brickhouse said one problematic sign from videos of the aircraft was that the landing gear was down at a phase of flight when it would typically be up.
'If you didn't know what was happening, you would think that plane was on approach to a runway,' Brickhouse said.
Boeing said it was in contact with Air India and working to gather more information. Boeing shares fell 5% as the crash posed a major setback for the planemaker as its new CEO looks to rebuild trust following a series of safety and production challenges.
Aircraft engine-maker GE Aerospace said that it would put a team together to go to India and analyse cockpit data, India's CNBC TV18 reported.
The U.S. National Transportation Safety Board said it would lead a team of U.S. investigators travelling to India to help in the investigation.
Britain was working with Indian authorities to urgently establish the facts around the crash and to provide support to those involved, the country's foreign office said.
'The tragedy in Ahmedabad has stunned and saddened us,' Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi posted on X. 'It is heartbreaking beyond words.' Gujarat is Modi's home state.
British Prime Minister Keir Starmer said images emerging of the crash were 'devastating'. A Buckingham Palace spokesperson said King Charles was also being kept updated.
India's first crash since 2020
Ahmedabad Airport, which suspended all flight operations after the crash, said it was operational again but with limited flights. The airport is operated by India's Adani Group conglomerate.
The last fatal plane crash in India, the world's third largest aviation market and its fastest growing, was in 2020 and involved Air India Express, the airline's low-cost arm.
The airline's Boeing-737 overshot a 'table-top' runway in southern India, skidded and plunged into a valley, crashing nose-first into the ground and killing 21 people.
The formerly state-owned Air India was taken over by Indian conglomerate Tata Group in 2022, and merged with Vistara – a joint venture between the group and Singapore Airlines – in 2024.
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Even after Punjabi became the dominant language in the liturgical sphere, Urdu retained its position as the primary language of worship, particularly in urban settings. As the lingua franca of colonial administration and post-partition national discourse, Urdu facilitated the gathering of worshippers from diverse regions and dialects in a unified liturgy. Its theological versatility also contributed to fostering interfaith familiarity. Words such as 'Allah' (God), 'Ruh-ul-Quddus' (Holy Spirit), and 'Masih' (Messiah) are shared across Islamic and Christian traditions, despite their divergent meanings. According to liturgical scholars, Urdu provided a rich repository of poetic devices, drawing upon Arabic, Persian, and Turkic traditions. Hymns and Psalms composed in Urdu were frequently set to musaddas (six-line) or ghazal-style meters and accompanied by tabla-driven ragas. This fusion of scriptural depth and lyrical intimacy rendered Urdu hymns both accessible and spiritually resonant. In the 1960s and 1970s, a second wave of vernacular creativity emerged, particularly within the Catholic Church. Inspired by the emphasis on liturgical inculturation outlined by Vatican II, missionaries in Pakistan embarked on the creation of Urdu-language hymnals that seamlessly integrated local musical traditions. Father Liberius Pieterse, a Dutch Franciscan stationed in Multan, published 'Hamd-Ullah' in 1955 and later co-edited 'Naya Geet Gao (Sing a New Song)' with poet Ghulam Masih Felix in 1972. Parallelly, figures such as Father Exo-Pierre and Father Laborious Azad composed settings of the Kyrie and Gloria in Urdu, employing raag bhairavi phrasing and tabla rhythms. These hymns introduced melodic scales and rhythms that resonated deeply with the Pakistani audience, transforming the auditory experience of Mass and imbuing it with both sacredness and familiarity. 'Naya Geet Gao' swiftly transcended denominational boundaries, finding resonance with Protestant choirs as well. Its triumph underscored the transformative power of inculturated hymnody in uniting Pakistan's fragmented Christian communities and conferring musical and theological significance upon worship. While church music shared many characteristics with Sufi qawwalis and Hindu bhajans, such as harmonium accompaniment, tabla rhythms, and poetic metaphors, it retained a distinct theological structure. Church hymns typically followed SATB (soprano, alto, tenor, bass) harmonies or unison singing with call-and-response sections. In contrast, qawwalis relied on solo improvisation, and bhajans on antiphonal chants. Terminologically, church hymns emphasised concepts like 'Yesu,' 'Najat,' and 'Salib,' while qawwalis focused on 'Nabi,' 'Wahdat,' and 'Ishq-e-Haqiqi.' It is also noteworthy that the call-and-response form in Christian music carries deeper psychological implications. This participatory structure has historically empowered congregants, particularly in rural and marginalised communities, to engage with Scripture not as passive listeners but as co-creators of worship. This is one reason why even today, the performance of the Zaboor continues to play a central role in village churches and revival meetings. Music, in these settings, becomes both a method of instruction and a mode of emotional healing. From 2010 onward, Pakistani church music entered the algorithmic era. YouTube channels such as Hallelujah Band and Zaboor Studios commenced producing professionally recorded Urdu and Punjabi worship videos. These were often structured in the musical language of Hillsong-style global worship: guitar-driven praise, layered harmonies, and emotionally charged choruses. However, unlike global megachurch music, these productions retained tabla, dholak, and folk instrumentation. One of Hallelujah Band's most viewed tracks, 'Rab Janay,' commences with a bhangra beat and transitions into an English hook: 'You know my heart.' This musical code-switching reflects a broader diasporic sensibility: young Christians singing to both God and algorithm, to both local community and global audience. Church music has long served as a form of spiritual resistance in Pakistan. Following the 2013 bombing at All Saints Church in Peshawar, mourners gathered amidst the rubble to sing Psalm 23 in Urdu. The footage, captured on mobile phones, gained widespread attention and became a symbol of national unity. In 2015, when suicide bombers targeted Catholic and Protestant churches in Lahore's Yohannaabad neighbourhood, youth choirs responded by singing through the streets, demonstrating their resilience and determination. In response to the Joseph Colony arson in 2013, which resulted in the destruction of over 150 homes, churches held overnight Zaboor recitations using harmoniums and candles. Following the Jaranwala church burnings in 2023, where 26 churches were torched, worshippers returned to sing Psalm 91 amidst the ashes, invoking divine protection. In Sargodha in 2024, after a mob attack on a Christian household, survivors gathered in homes to chant Zaboor in whispers, resisting erasure through sacred sound. Theologians and musicians argue that these acts exemplify monumental memory: the preservation of suffering and hope through sound. Church music not only commemorates trauma but also reclaims space. In a sonic-theological perspective, lament transforms into protest through praise. Simultaneously, in the diaspora, from Toronto and Dubai to Birmingham and Melbourne, Punjabi Christians continue to practice their faith in three languages, spanning across four time zones. Diaspora churches harmoniously blend Shahbaz's Punjabi Psalms with Hillsong choruses, disseminate Sunday services on platforms such as Facebook and Instagram, and creatively remix Naya Geet Gao classics into electronic dance music (EDM) sets for youth conferences. This transnational musical fusion transcends geographical boundaries, fostering a vibrant and postcolonial liturgical community that is both multilingual and distinctly alive. Numerous Pakistani renowned musicians, including S.B. John, Saleem Raza, and A. Nayyar, initially received training in church choirs. Their contributions to Lollywood film music incorporated elements of gospel phrasing, harmonic layering, and spiritual lyricism. Presently, programmes like Coke Studio Pakistan continue this crossover legacy. For instance, Hadia Hashmi's rendition of 'Bol Hu' draws upon Christian vocal stylings and melodic structures prevalent in Urdu worship. In Pakistani Punjab, church music serves not merely as a liturgical embellishment. It constitutes a space where colonial form intersects with local expression, where Scripture is sung in folk metre, and where faith persists despite adversity. Whether through kirtan-like harmonium chants or digital mashups incorporating English refrains, this music embodies a theology that undergoes constant reimagination through resistance, sound, and community. Church music plays a pivotal role in interfaith dialogue and public memory. In various regions of Punjab, Christian worship groups are invited to perform at civic festivals or university gatherings, particularly during Christmas or interfaith harmony week. These performances, often delivered in Punjabi and Urdu, underscore the shared aesthetic and emotional language of religious music across Pakistan's diverse communities. When Zaboor is performed in a setting that also includes Sufi qawwalis or Sikh shabads, it not only demonstrates musical convergence but also fosters mutual respect. In such moments, sacred sound becomes a connecting bridge between traditions through emotion, narrative, and reverence. Another aspect worthy of note is the role of female voices in church music, which is often underrepresented in formal liturgical settings. Over the past decade, more Christian women have emerged as soloists, worship leaders, and composers. In choirs from Youhanabad to Gujranwala, female vocalists now lead Psalms in congregations and livestream performances. Their presence adds novel textures to sacred music and challenges traditional gender hierarchies within ecclesial spaces. Furthermore, youth-led worship collectives such as The Worship Project Pakistan and Rising Faith Ministries have commenced organising open-air concerts and praise nights, particularly during Easter and Christmas. These gatherings often combine classical Zaboor settings with contemporary genres such as pop-rock, acoustic folk, and even spoken word poetry. By merging tradition with experimentation, young Christians ensure that church music remains a pertinent and evolving expression of faith. Lastly, education initiatives surrounding music literacy are gaining traction. Institutions like Forman Christian College in Lahore and St. Thomas Seminary in Karachi now provide formal training in church music, composition, and theology. Through workshops, certificate programs, and performance ensembles, a new generation of trained liturgists and composers emerges equipped not only with musical proficiency but also with a profound understanding of their heritage. Church music in Pakistani Punjab encapsulates the intricate and multifaceted identity of a post-colonial nation: multilingual, devotional, politically aware, and profoundly resilient. Drawing inspiration from Bhabha's concept of hybridity, it seamlessly integrates Western liturgical practices with Punjabi emotional expressions. Through cultural memory, it effectively resists the erosion of historical recollections; through inculturation, it maintains its strong connection to its cultural roots; and through sonic theology, it effectively communicates without the need for verbal articulation. As Christian communities persistently face marginalisation, their music continues to serve as a poignant soundtrack of survival, embodying a theology not merely spoken but also manifested through the act of singing. Brian Bassanio Paul is a music enthusiast whose expertise lies at the intersection of music business, artist development, music appreciation, and cultural studies. He can be reached at and on LinkedIn @brianbassanio All facts and information are the sole responsibility of the author
