A Mumbai couple, Vinod Kolekar and Chetana, along with their son, Swanand, were on board the missing Malaysian Airlines flight from Kuala Lumpur to Beijing to visit their older son, Sanved, who is doing post-doctoral studies in the Chinese capital.
Kranti Shirsath, 44, from Pune, another of the five Indians on board, was on her way to meet her husband in North Korea, official sources said.
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“Sanved sent me a message on WhatsApp in the morning saying that he could not trace his parents. He even sent me a screenshot of their flight tickets. I was trying to contact Malaysian Airlines from here,” his close friend, who chose to remain anonymous, told The Hindu . He has been in touch with Sanved through the day.
The Kolekars, residing at Yoginagar in suburban Borivali West, left for Beijing on Friday night after a stopover in Kuala Lumpur.
Swanand, 23, had completed his engineering degree and was planning to do M.Tech. Vinod, 59, retired as engineer and is now a consultant. His wife, 55, took voluntary retirement from the laboratory of a major hospital in Mumbai.
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Sanved, 29, is a graduate from the Indian Institute of Technology, Roorkee.
“Sanved’s parents and brother were looking forward to be with him. I am really worried about them. I wish they had survived and somebody had rescued them,” another friend of Sanved from his Ruparel College days said.