Minister of State for External Affairs, General V K Singh, who had gone to escort back the dead bodies, had tweeted a video of him helping Iraqi officials in lifting the coffins and placing them in the plane. He had captioned the video "some responsibilities weigh a lot".
In an exclusive talk to ABP News , VK Singh said , that he had carried out a heavy responsibility of bringing back the deceased bodies to India and then delivering those to the families. He said: "Yesterday I also lifted a coffin along with others. Iraqi people too lifted the coffins and we kept standing there until all the coffins were loaded in the plane. We had placed every body with utter regard, but we deeply regret the fact that we had to bring back our men this way."
On being asked about the details about how they were killed, Singh replied: " It is mentioned in the death certificates of those killed." He went on to elaborate that while some were killed by gunshots, for others it is difficult to ascertain the cause of the death as they had been dumped underground for a very long time which created a lot of damage for forensic activities.
He said that when the grieving families met External Affairs Minister Sushma Swaraj, she had assured them that they will be provided with ex-gratia relief. She has asked for the details of the young members of the family , who will be provided jobs according to their skills and qualifications.
On the protests by the opposition parties , Singh said that politics should have been kept out of this since the very first day. Whether from Bengal or Punjab or Bihar, the people who died were our own and we all should avoid politics and support our people.