The 12-year-old daughter of wing commander Prithvi Singh Chauhan, who died in the helicopter crash along with General Bipin Rawat and 11 others recently, said she wanted to follow her father's footsteps and become an Indian Air Force (IAF) pilot too.

After lighting her father's pyre along with her brother Aviraj (7) and cousin Pushpendra Singh at the Tajganj Crematorium in Agra in the presence of her family members, Aaradhya, a Class VII student, said she wanted to emulate her father because he was her hero. "My father used to advise me to focus on my studies and not chase marks. He believed marks would follow if I focused on studies," she said. Officials from the IAF, Agra administration and police among others, too, paid their tributes to the wing commander.

He joined the service in 2000 and was flying with the Chief of Defence Staff as part of his assignment at the IAF station in Coimbatore, Tamil Nadu, during the crash. Prithvi's family migrated from Gwalior in Madhya Pradesh to Agra in 2006.