‘Officer could have drowned while saving others in Congo’

New Delhi: An Indian Army officer who drowned during a kayaking expedition in Congo last week may have died while trying to save two of his colleagues, Army officials said in New Delhi on Monday.
Lieutenant Colonel Gaurav Solanki (37), who was on a UN Peacekeeping Mission to Congo in central Africa, had gone missing from Lake Kivu on September 8. His body was fished out on September 12 from the lake, located on the border between Congo and Rwanda, following four days of extensive search operations undertaken with speedboats and helicopters.
On Monday, Solanki’s family conducted his last rites in Delhi after his body arrived on a flight from Congo late on the evening of September 15.
An Army official said Solanki had accompanied a team of officials to the lake for kayaking. Solanki did not return from the trip along with other officials.
Solanki had been sent on the UN mission in September 2018 and his one-year tenure was about to get over soon. As per sources, he had been elevated to the rank of a Colonel in November 2018, while he was still on the UN mission, even though he was to formally take charge in his regiment later this year.
Speaking to IANS, Solanki’s father-in-law Dayanand Hooda said the officials had ventured into the lake in two-seater kayaks.