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2 months after he died in Dubai, Punjab family finally brings son's body home
Babushahi Bureau
Amritsar (Punjab), August 8, 2025 — For 20-year-old Gagandeep Singh, leaving his village of Saraspur near Dhariwal in Gurdaspur district for Dubai six months ago was a leap toward a better future.
He had gone with dreams of earning enough to ease his family’s struggles. But on June 10, those dreams were cut short when he died suddenly of a heart attack in the foreign city.
What followed was an agonising wait. For two months, his family had no way to bring him home. His body remained in a Dubai mortuary as paperwork, formalities, and costs stood in the way. Days turned into weeks, and the family’s grief deepened with every sunrise that passed without their son.
With mounting formalities and costs, the family had no way to bring him back — until Dubai-based philanthropist Dr. S.P. Singh Oberoi stepped in. Working with the Indian Embassy and his local team in Punjab, he arranged all paperwork and bore the expenses to have the young man’s body flown to Amritsar.
On Friday, their wait ended. Gagandeep’s coffin arrived at Sri Guru Ramdas International Airport in Amritsar. His brothers — Akashdeep, Raja, and Ashish — along with uncles and relatives, stood in silence as the casket was lowered and placed into an ambulance for the journey back to their village.
Neighbours and friends gathered along the road as the vehicle approached, many bowing their heads as it passed.
For the family, it was a moment both of heartbreak and of closure — after weeks of uncertainty, they could finally perform his last rites and give him a resting place among his own.