Seated in 11A on the Ahmedabad–London Boeing 787 that nosedived into a medical hostel on June 12, the 40-year-old British-Indian kicked open a fuselage tear, fracturing legs, shoulders and spine while his brother Ajay burned beside him. Five months on, he cannot walk unaided, drive or speak to his three-year-old son.

“I wake screaming. My wife sleeps on the sofa. My mother hasn’t eaten properly since,” Ramesh whispered from the darkened living room of his Leicester home. Their Diu fish farm once the family’s pandemic pivot from garments lies abandoned; no one is left to haul nets.

Retired solicitor Radd Seiger, now the family’s voice, fired a letter to Air India CEO Campbell Wilson demanding a bespoke welfare package. The airline’s £21,500 interim cheque identical to bereaved families’ covers “barely two months of private therapy the NHS can’t provide,” Seiger said.

Air India insists 95 per cent of kin have received the same advance and Tata executives are scheduling personal visits. A sit-down with Ramesh is “imminent,” a spokesman added.

Back in Diu, father Rameshbhai keeps vigil outside his son’s empty childhood room. “One boy gone, one boy broken,” he said. Cousin Sunny reports nightly 3 a.m. terrors: “He bolts upright, yelling Ajay’s name.”

With the AAIB probe still pinning blame on dual-engine cutoff, Montreal Convention caps loom at £130,000 unless wilful neglect is proven. Seiger wants Air India to bypass courts and fund physio, counselling and income replacement now.