NEW DELHI - THE charismatic head of southern India's largest state was confirmed to have died after a massive search and rescue mission found his remains in his mangled helicopter that crashed into the hillside of a tropical forest on Wednesday.

Dr Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy, chief minister of Andhra Pradesh state, would probably have died instantly when the pilot of the Bell 430 helicopter, buffeted by gusting monsoon winds and blinded by dense rain, either lost control or steered it into the ground, people familiar with the details said.

Four others on the plane - two pilots, his principal secretary and head of security - also perished. The pilots, one of whom was an air force group captain on secondment, were vastly experienced officers, with some 9,000 hours of flying experience between them.

'India has lost an ideal chief minister who was a role model for other states,' Prime Minister Manmohan Singh said in a statement on Thursday, echoing the national grief over Dr Reddy's death. 'Dr Y.S.R. will be remembered for his unwavering commitment to the development of his state.'

The death of Dr Reddy, a medical doctor by training, comes as a huge blow to the ruling Congress party and its president, Mrs Sonia Gandhi, to whose family he was intensely loyal. The 60-year-old politician had steered the Congress to an impressive electoral victory in parliamentary and state assembly polls earlier this year.

His grip on the state, the largest among southern India's five provinces, was a crucial factor in PM Singh retaining power in New Delhi. Known to be a committed grassroots worker, Dr Reddy had been on a whistle- stop tour of several districts to check on development projects.

Despite news of bad weather en route, he took off from the state capital Hyderabad at about 8.30am on Wednesday to fly to Chittoor in the south. Forty minutes later, the aircraft lost radio contact with Hyderabad air traffic control. India then mounted what is believed to be one of its biggest peacetime search operations to locate Dr Reddy.

After five Indian Air Force helicopters were forced to turn away because of bad weather, unmanned aerial vehicles pulled out from the Pakistan border, Sukhoi 30 MKI- series aircraft diverted from the Tibetan frontier and satellites from the Indian Space Research Organisation were put to immediate use to scour the ground over a 1,300 sq km area.

Mrs Gandhi and PM Singh will fly on Friday to Hyderabad to convey their condolences to Dr Reddy's family, which shares the Roman Catholic faith with Mrs Gandhi. The chief minister's body will lie in state for several hours before it is taken to his hometown for final rites.

On Thursday, Dr Reddy's charred body arrived for autopsy in Kurnool town, carried by the ambulance service that had proved such a vote-getter for him.

Read the full story in Friday's edition of The Straits Times

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