Tribute to a Heroic Figure

Smita, hello.

Hello, sir.

How are you? How is your health now?

Sir, everything is fine. Everything is fine, sir.

Look, the entire country

is praying for you.

Everyone is chanting the Mahamrityunjaya mantra.

Your courage,

your patience,

and your presence of mind

and in a fraction of a second, you made so many decisions

and saved so many lives.

And today, the entire country

can proudly say

that we Indians

are not people who take lives.

We are people who save lives.

Sir, you

yourself

suffered such a major injury to your body.

You yourself

were fighting a battle between life and death.

Even at that time,

you did not care about your own life.

You cared about the lives of all the passengers.

And most importantly,

you raised the honor of 1.4 billion countrymen.

And therefore, I

feel deeply, deeply proud from my heart.

Yesterday, I

got the opportunity to speak with Bhupendra Bhai. I spoke with Geeta Behen,

I spoke with Sonal Behen.

I couldn't do it with Java and Bobby. But I told Sister Gita

that your name is Gita,

but you have Krishna's Gita

completely

digested.

And you have

Smita

With the values of the Gita incarnate,

she shaped his life.

Smita, now I'd like to hear from you.

Sir, for me, I... I was telling Sir as well.

You are my greatest, greatest idol,

and by calling me like this, you're encouraging me.

I feel very, very, very proud.

I

in that moment, sir,

I, I was fighting for my,

I was fighting for my life.

but there was a moment when I realized that if I didn't do something

because I had fallen. I had sustained so many injuries that I

had fallen down

and

at that time, I said that if I didn't get up. I have been flying aircraft for Air India

for 17 years. I have been a captain for the past 11 years

years.

And even with my eyes closed, I could tell what was happening on the plane.

When I had fallen down, I could hear

that the aircraft was going down.

And I knew exactly this was one final push if Smit

did it.

The door was right there.

Even then, I was still getting beaten up.

I just opened it, sir. Everyone else came, and everyone else had just as much

of a role in it,

had a role in it.

But I was deliberately telling everyone that I was doing it at the risk of my own life.

But at the same time, I also knew that I couldn't save all of them.

save them.

Just after that,

people here, and in Saudi as well, gave me

or by doing that,

anything better than this

care and better medical attention

couldn't have been received.

And I, sir, I am just… I am only

positivity. Whenever I get a chance, I

only have one thing in mind. I only recite the Hanuman Chalisa.

Even then, I was only reciting the Hanuman Chalisa, and I knew that God would save me.

God will save me.

I just got a call from you. I felt

very, very proud. I feel it now. I wasn’t proud of myself

until now. Now I am, sir. Sorry that

I’m crying in front of you, sir.

Smita.

If not in front of me,

where else would you get emotional?

Sir, I never thought I would get to speak with you.

I never thought so.

You have done such great work, brother,

that every citizen today

People around the world are eager to see you, to speak with you,

very eager, in fact.

And what you said about the Hanuman Chalisa,

for that, I bow to Geeta Behn for giving you such

values. I bow to Bhupendra Bhai.

And I— let me tell you, Smita, yesterday when I spoke to Sonal Behn

with her,

with her,

I was surprised.

She spoke with such composure.

She spoke with such courage.

Truly.

I had not imagined that Sister Sonal, in such circumstances,

could speak so cheerfully.

So I believe that, as a family,

you have truly

brought glory to the entire country.

Sir, every morning when I pray, my two-year-old son

sits in my lap, and I recite the Hanuman Chalisa to him

what I have been told,

because today we are far from the country, but we must not be far from our culture.

We should not.

That is true.

And right now, it does not even feel like we are far from the country. Here,

the people here

with great love and attention, my…

You may not know. People in Sabarkumbha too,

in Wadhwan too,

everyone

has created such an emotional atmosphere, and across all of India as well, it is happening.

Yesterday, worship was held in all the temples,

prayers and aarti were held. Aarti was held at all pilgrimage sites.

And all for your long life and excellent health.

Everyone is praying. So you will soon be completely well.

India is very eager to welcome you.

I can understand whatever physical discomfort you may be experiencing now.

You are a brave man, so perhaps enduring wounds must be

very easy for you now.

No, sir, I, I am not thinking of that wound as a wound.

Because otherwise, it would make my recovery even more difficult.

My recovery.

I am thinking of it as a journey that will happen slowly, slowly,

and it will take time, but I am very, very

confident that this recovery will happen

and I will become completely healthy.

I also sincerely thank the Saudi government and the UAE government

for taking such good care of you.

I am grateful to them as well.

Sumit, whenever you need me, I am just a phone call away.

But you, you truly,

Otherwise, this

Yesterday, I saw how people expressed their feelings on social media

and said that if this hadn't happened, who knows what India would have gone through.

What all of India's pilots would have gone through?

How all of India's pilots would have been viewed?

You have saved everyone. That is, you have done a very great thing.

You have done it.

When I meet you, I'll hear the inside story later. Because I don't want

to discuss such things with you on the mobile.

And may you also recover completely.

And now the entire country is completely with you.

I don't want to trouble you too much.

My very best wishes to you. Today is Gandhi Jayanti.

You have shown by living it what nonviolence is.

Jai Shri Krishna. First, speak a little in Gujarati.

Jai Shri Krishna.

Bobby, does she speak Gujarati or not?

Bebo speaks, sir, Bebo.

Bebo speaks Gujarati.

Bebo didn't teach me Gujarati, then she taught me English.

Okay.

Arrangements were made to meet the children. The doctors allowed us to meet them.

My elder daughter came. But she can't bear to see all this. She's slightly… Okay.

Okay.

She's the younger one. She's very close to me.

And my younger son is two years old. They don't allow him.

No, for now, we need to see at seven.

But Sonalben is very courageous.

Yes, sir.

Yes, sir.

Yesterday, you spoke to me very clearly.

Otherwise, I've experienced that in this situation, there's no talk of anything.

Not even a trace of a complaint.

Yesterday, I spoke with Bhupendrabhai and Gitabhai at Mumbai Airport.

They too had not even a trace of a complaint.

We only had one thing to say, that God will make everything right.

That's all, sir. We're just holding on to that.

All right, Jai Shri Krishna, and get well very soon. Then we'll

meet.

Yes, sir.

God bless you.

Jai Hind.