Three Indian sailors were killed after the US military struck the MT Settebello, an oil tanker in the Gulf of Oman, on Wednesday, triggering grief across India and prompting diplomatic protests from New Delhi.
The vessel was carrying 24 Indian crew members at the time of the strike. Twenty-one were rescued, while chief engineer Patnala Suresh, cadet Aditya Sharma and fitter Shivanand Chaurasia were killed, according to India's Ministry of Ports, Shipping and Waterways.
For the families left behind, however, the focus remains on the men they lost.
"He told me he would be home soon. I never imagined he would return like this," Suresh's wife, Patnala Bhargavi, told the BBC. The couple had been preparing to celebrate their 15th wedding anniversary later this month. Instead, Bhargavi is now waiting for her husband's body to be brought back home.
According to the US military, the strike was part of efforts to enforce a blockade on Iran-linked shipping. The US Central Command said in a post on X that one of its aircraft fired "precision munitions" into the tanker's engine room "after the crew repeatedly failed" to follow directions. The vessel's manager, IOS Marine FZE, rejected claims that the tanker ignored warnings or was carrying Iranian crude and called for a transparent international investigation into the matter. It further claimed that it received no warning before it was ultimately attacked.
The Settebello "holds no affiliation whatsoever with Iran or Iranian oil", it said in a statement posted on X by Forward Seamen's Union of India.
As diplomatic tensions unfold, Bhargavi told the BBC that her thoughts remain fixed on her final conversation with her husband. "There have been attacks in this area and some people have been killed. But don't worry about me. I'll come home safely, and we'll celebrate our anniversary properly," she recalled Suresh telling her before communication was lost.
The 39-year-old said the family had become accustomed to Suresh's long absences at sea during his nearly 15-year career as a marine engineer. "The entire family depended on his income. Now I don't know how I'll educate or raise the children," Bhargavi said. Suresh is survived by two sons and two nieces whom he helped support after the deaths of Bhargavi's elder sister and brother-in-law.
The same grief is being felt hundreds of kilometres away in Himachal Pradesh's Hamirpur district, where the family of 23-year-old Aditya Sharma is mourning the loss of their only son. "I want my son's body to be returned to us. We should also be told what happened in his final moments," his father, Rajesh Sharma, told BBC Hindi. Rajesh Sharma also questioned the circumstances surrounding the rescue operation. "The others were rescued, so why couldn't these three be saved?" he asked.
In Uttar Pradesh's Deoria district, relatives of 35-year-old Shivanand Chaurasia are waiting for answers as well. Chaurasia, a fitter, had left home around eight months ago to work for a foreign shipping company. "We spoke to him the night before last. He told us everything was fine," his father, Ramji Chaurasia, told ANI. "Now we have been told that he is no more."
The deaths have prompted a response from both the Indian government and the maritime sector. In a post on X, Union Shipping Minister Sarbananda Sonowal described the deaths as a 'profound loss' to India's maritime community and said efforts were under way to bring the sailors' bodies home. India has also lodged a protest with the United States over the strike, summoning a senior US diplomat and calling for an end to attacks on commercial vessels operating in the region.
"I strongly condemn any act from any party that endangers the lives of seafarers and the safety of international shipping. This is simply unacceptable," Arsenio Dominguez, secretary-general of the UN's shipping agency the International Maritime Organization, said on Wednesday.
For the mourning families, however, geopolitics remains a distant concern.
