PATHANAMTHITTA: A pall of grief descended on Pullad in Pathanamtitta on Thursday as news broke that Ranjitha Gopakumaran Nair was among the victims of the Air India flight crash in Ahmedabad on Thursday.
Ranjitha,39, a nurse, was returning to the UK, where she worked, after a brief visit to her home.
The tragedy has left her two children – Induchoodan, and Idhika – and elderly mother, Thulasi, devastated. As news about her death was confirmed by the district administration around 4.30pm, a large number of people gathered at her ancestral home in Vadakkekavala.
Ranjitha, who had worked as a nurse in Salalah, Oman, and later in the UK, was on the cusp of fulfilling her life’s aspirations. She had been working in the UK for the past eight months and returned to India recently to complete the formalities for renewing the government job she had in Kerala.
She had secured a job at the Pathanamthitta General Hospital five years ago and was on long leave during which she worked abroad. She had been constructing a new house at Pullad and was planning to move into it along with her children soon. “Ranjitha’s visit home was brief. After completing the paperwork for her government job, she was returning to the UK when the tragedy struck,” said Aneesh Varikkannamala, KPCC secretary and close associate of the family.
Ranjitha left home on Wednesday afternoon. She travelled to Ernakulam from Tiruvalla on a train and flew from Nedumbassery to Chennai and then to Ahmedabad, from where she boarded the ill-fated flight to London.
Neighbours recalled that she had wished to settle down in her hometown and live with her children and mother in their new house.
The youngest daughter of the Gopakumaran Nair-Thulasi couple, Ranjitha pursued graduation in nursing at Pandalam and began her career at a hospital in Gujarat. She later worked in Oman before moving to the UK last year.
Her son is a Class 10 student and her daughter is in Class 7. She has two elder brothers, both employed abroad.