ON ANGELS’ WINGS — Beyond the Bombing of Air India 182
My Journey of resilience and courage
This is a sons tribute to his fallen family, who were slain by a terrorist bomb while he was only 17. The Air India 182 Kanishka tragedy was the world's worst terrorist act until 9/11 happened. Even today, it is the world's worst aviation bombing.
Why now?—This book had been in my heart for so many years that I had yearned to write it, but circumstances did not permit me, or maybe I never felt the fire within my soul as I do now.
Few may understand it, but I got this calling—this deep, intense feeling within—that my family had been seeking me out for ever so long.
They wanted me to come home to the only place we all knew, at the edge of the universe, where the mountains meet the oceans, where we were really together, one with each other and our Lord and creator, to that solemn spot in Dunmanus Bay, Ahakista.
And so, I took an early retirement from Air India to pursue my madness and follow my heart—to go find my family—and whether it was through travelling the world, writing, or doing copyright law through Harvardx at 55, I wanted to do it all, and I did it.
My life was forged through a series of tragedies, and my spirit was melded into that fire. They were circumstances beyond my control, and destiny just happened to me. I allowed myself to be burned in the flames of death, sadness, and heartache, and like a Samurai’s sword, I became stronger with every flame and with each passing day, learning to live with tragedy and fight to succeed or at least die trying to.
I was literally left as an orphan in the wake of this devastating tragedy at the sensitive age of 17, surviving through the love of a few around me but taking each day in the genuine hope that my family would come back to me someday.
The name Ahakista comes from the ancient Irish phrase “Atha an Chiste,” which means “the ford of the treasure,” and for all of us victims of Kanishka AI-182, it truly is the ford of the treasures of our soul. It also loosely translates into “appreciation for people,” and if there is one thing I have learned in my life, it is the beautiful love for people that the Irish in Cork County have.
This year, visiting Ahakista on the shores of the North Atlantic and touching those waters to meet my family once more made me realise, deep down, how much they needed me to tell their stories for the world to know.
They had waited for 38 years for their son to write the words that they so much wanted to say to the world.
This was a call so deep within me that I felt strongly once I visited, and it kept drawing me back.
This year I lived across the road on the hill, overlooking the memorial, to make sure I was always close at hand if my family summoned me. I had a feeling deep down that Daddy was calling me, and I had to be there for him.
Being there, I felt a peace that I had not felt in almost four decades—that they had been waiting for me to make this trip. To see them after so long, I felt like I was truly home.
That night, I sat down and began writing. I wrote and wrote, and I cried for my family, looking out to the calm Atlantic Ocean, calling me, and I knew this was a voice that came from within and would not stop until I had poured every word from my heart onto the reams of paper.
History beckoned, and I felt it in my soul to write this trilogy. My words flowed into more than 2,50,000 words that I will be presenting for reading in three parts.
This is not merely my life story; this is the story of a journey that I took for my family, my Angels’, guided by them.
It is my family’s story that was begging to be written, and my Angels’ egged me, within my consciousness and my spirit, to tell it as best as I could, as any loving son would.
To leave Ahakista each time is like saying goodbye to them once again, and it has pained me every single time. It is only the love of the Irish that has kept me comforted, for I know that the sleepy little coastal town will love and care for my family like no one else can.
My visit this year strengthened that resolve, and writing is all that I have done every single day since then.
There was so much pain and so many memories that I had shut out and closed down for all these years. There were so many meetings, incidents, and people I had forced myself to forget, but in the course of my research, finding old documents, old letters, my old emails, and my exam results, the pain, the hurt, and the memories came flooding back, like an avalanche bursting out in a waterfall of tears, flooding through my life.
There were nights when I couldn’t sleep, crying now for a tragedy that occurred decades ago because I had buried the grief so deeply in my subconscious that no one could ever find it.
Reading through Sylvia’s handwritten diary from 43 years ago and seeing Daddy’s notes there made me realise what they went through when we were fighting for Sandeep’s life. No account of our lives would ever be complete without writing about my darling brother Sandeep, and this is as much an ode to his altogether brief life as it is theirs or mine.
I still wait for the day that I can be reunited with the four of them—Sandeep, Sandeeta, Daddy, and Sylvia. Maybe someday…….
This book and my trilogy are to honour the sacrifices of all the 331 victims of the Air India 182 Kanishka and Narita bombings and all the victims of all other incidents of terrorism around the world, so that no one may ever forget and no one may ever try to rewrite that dark chapter of history.
The writer is an author and Harvard Law Professional with 37 years’ experience in aviation, law, public speaking, and leadership coaching. He is available at @lazar1 on Linked-In & @sjlazars on X (formerly Twitter)
His book ‘On Angels’ Wings—Beyond the bombing of Air India 182' is currently available on Amazon.in