Residents wear protective face masks in the Deira district of Dubai. Pawan Singh / The National
Residents wear protective face masks in the Deira district of Dubai. Pawan Singh / The National
Residents wear protective face masks in the Deira district of Dubai. Pawan Singh / The National
Residents wear protective face masks in the Deira district of Dubai. Pawan Singh / The National

Body of missing Indian man found in Dubai


Salam Al Amir
  • English
  • Arabic

The body of a man who went missing three months ago was found in the sea near a hotel in Dubai.

On Friday, police said Sreedharan Devakumar, a 54-year-old Indian man, was reported missing by friends on April 28.

He was working for a car rental company and had been due to fly home to Kerala to see his family. His flight was cancelled due to the Covid-19 outbreak.

At the time, police were able to track some of his movements before he disappeared using CCTV.

Last month, police were called to a five-star hotel in Deira where a man's body had washed ashore.

The body was identified as Devakumar, based on the clothes he was last seen wearing. A key to his home and a necklace were also found on Devakumar and helped identify him.

Police used the key to unlock the door to Devakumar's flat in Deira, where forensic experts collected samples from his tooth brush for a DNA test that acted as the final confirmation. This wallet and mobile phone had been left in his flat.
Colleagues of the deceased also confirmed that the necklace found on the body belonged to Devakumar.

The cause of death was not released by police but they said there was no criminal activity involved.

Devakumar's body has now been returned to his wife and two children, who are understood to live in the south Indian state.

Planes grounded by coronavirus

British Airways: Cancels all direct flights to and from mainland China 

Hong Kong-based Cathay Pacific: Cutting capacity to/from mainland China by 50 per cent from Jan. 30

Chicago-based United Airlines: Reducing flights to Beijing, Shanghai, and Hong Kong

Ai Seoul:  Suspended all flights to China

Finnair: Suspending flights to Nanjing and Beijing Daxing until the end of March

Indonesia's Lion Air: Suspending all flights to China from February

South Korea's Asiana Airlines,  Jeju Air  and Jin Air: Suspend all flights

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Some of French groups are threatening Friday to continue their journey to Brussels, the capital of Belgium and the European Union, and to meet up with drivers from other countries on Monday.

Belgian authorities joined French police in banning the threatened blockade. A similar lorry cavalcade was planned for Friday in Vienna but cancelled after authorities prohibited it.

Some of Darwish's last words

"They see their tomorrows slipping out of their reach. And though it seems to them that everything outside this reality is heaven, yet they do not want to go to that heaven. They stay, because they are afflicted with hope." - Mahmoud Darwish, to attendees of the Palestine Festival of Literature, 2008

His life in brief: Born in a village near Galilee, he lived in exile for most of his life and started writing poetry after high school. He was arrested several times by Israel for what were deemed to be inciteful poems. Most of his work focused on the love and yearning for his homeland, and he was regarded the Palestinian poet of resistance. Over the course of his life, he published more than 30 poetry collections and books of prose, with his work translated into more than 20 languages. Many of his poems were set to music by Arab composers, most significantly Marcel Khalife. Darwish died on August 9, 2008 after undergoing heart surgery in the United States. He was later buried in Ramallah where a shrine was erected in his honour.