Maharashtra Gives ₹1 Crore Ex-Gratia to IAF Pilot Purvesh Duragkar’s Parents After Su-30MKI Crash

Nagpur, October 30, 2026: The Maharashtra government has sanctioned and disbursed Rs 1 crore in ex-gratia assistance to the parents of Flight Lieutenant Purvesh Duragkar, the Indian Air Force pilot from Nagpur who was killed in the crash of a Su-30MKI fighter aircraft in Assam’s Karbi Anglong district on March 5, 2026.

District Sainik Welfare Officer Major Anand Patharkar (Retd) handed over the assistance to Ravindra Duragkar and Sandhya Duragkar in Nagpur on Thursday. The amount was divided equally between the two parents, with each receiving Rs 50 lakh. Major Patharkar said the state had approved the Rs 1 crore ex-gratia grant for the family and the cheque was released after the necessary approval was received.

Flight Lieutenant Duragkar was serving as a navigator on a Su-30MKI attached to a frontline fighter squadron under Eastern Air Command. The aircraft had taken off from Air Force Station Jorhat on a training sortie and lost radar contact around 7:42 pm. It crashed in a remote, hilly and forested stretch near Inglong Ekopi / Rongkhelan in Karbi Anglong district, about 60 km from the airbase. The wreckage was found the next day, and the Indian Air Force confirmed that both pilots had died. Neither of them was able to eject.

Born in 1998, Duragkar was about 28 years old at the time of his death. He completed Class X at South Public School, Nagpur, in 2015 and later earned a BSc in Computer Science from Dr Ambedkar College. Before joining the IAF, he trained at the Defence Services Academy in Bhandara while preparing for defence examinations. He was also active in the National Cadet Corps, represented Maharashtra in six national camps, and took part in aero-modelling competitions.

He joined the Indian Air Force through the AFCAT route and was commissioned as a Flying Officer on December 7, 2022. He was later promoted to Flight Lieutenant. Although he was originally posted at Tezpur, he was operating from Jorhat because of runway work at Tezpur.

Duragkar had taken part in Operation Sindoor in May 2025, the military operation launched in response to the Pahalgam terror attack. He is survived by his parents and his sister Sayali, who is settled in the United States. He had visited his family in Nagpur around 10 days before the crash.

The Rs 1 crore grant is part of Maharashtra’s policy of providing ex-gratia assistance to the next of kin of defence personnel from the state who are killed in action or in operational circumstances. The policy has been in force since 2019, after earlier revisions that increased the amount over time. In this case, the assistance was processed and paid about eight months after the accident.

The Indian Air Force had earlier expressed condolences and said its personnel stood firmly with the bereaved families. The crash was among the latest Su-30MKI accidents in the Northeast in recent years.