Diplomat saw it all for India

Three days after S.J.S. Chhatwal landed in Ottawa on June 20, 1985, as India's high commissioner, Air India Flight 182, en route to New Delhi from Toronto and Montreal, was bombed, killing 329 people.
"I was still suffering from jet leg," he said.
"This news of the horrendous tragedy hit me hard. I was absolutely stunned and I didn't know which way to look."
Joe Clark, then minister for external affairs, invited Chhatwal to the June 24 condolence meeting at Nathan Phillips Square in.
"It was the saddest journey I ever took," Chhatwal says, describing his flight from Ottawa to Toronto with Clark.
In his 35-year diplomatic career, Chhatwal has attended a number of condolence meetings. But that one, he said, he'll never forget.
"I felt family members who turned up there were like corpses moving around," he says.
"My heart goes out in sympathy for those whose families perished in the tragedy," he adds. "I know some women whose entire families perished. I know of a man who too lost his entire family. A couple of years in Canada, he couldn't take it any more and moved out to do charitable work in India."
There are countless such stories to recount and cry about, Chhatwal says.
He has been retired for 17 years now but he's still cautious about weighing in on the ongoing inquiry.
"Yes, I read about it. I can't comment on the investigation. I was not part of it."
Unlike many of his colleagues, he's also unwilling to criticize the Canadian law enforcement agencies despite the recent disclosures at the Air India inquiry.
As for his life as a diplomat, dealing with crisis after crisis, he says he got used to it.
30/05/07 Ajit Jain/Toronto Sun, Canada

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Categories: Air India May 2007, Foreign May 2007, Safety May 2007