The British man who survived the Air India plane crash told his family “I don’t know how I’m alive” in a phone call seconds after the plane came down, his brother has told Sky News.

Vishwash Kumar Ramesh is the only passenger reported to have survived after Air India Flight 171 crashed into a building shortly after take-off in Ahmedabad, Gujarat on Thursday afternoon.

India plane crash – latest updates

Relatives confirmed they had spoken to him since the crash – but they have not been able to contact his brother who was also believed to be on board.

Speaking from Leicester, Mr Ramesh’s brother Nayan told Sky News’ Shamaan Freeman-Powell that their father was on the phone to Vishwash while the plane was still on the runway.

“My dad called him,” the 27 year old said. “And Vishwash said ‘oh we’re going to take off soon.”

Two minutes later, their father received a video call from Mr Ramesh to say the plane had crashed and he had survived.

“He video called my dad as he crashed and said ‘Oh the plane’s crashed. I don’t know where my brother is. I don’t see any other passengers. I don’t know how I’m alive – how I exited the plane’,” Nayan said.

Vidhi Chaudhary, a senior police officer in Ahmedabad, said Mr Ramesh was “near the emergency exit” and “managed to escape by jumping out the emergency door”.

Mr Ramesh earlier told the Hindustan Times that he heard a “loud noise” around 30 seconds after take-off – and before the plane went down.

“It all happened so quickly,” he told the newspaper, adding he had received “impact injuries” to his chest, eyes and feet.

“When I got up, there were bodies all around me. I was scared. I stood up and ran. There were pieces of the plane all around me.

“Someone grabbed hold of me and put me in an ambulance and brought me to the hospital.”

Sky News India correspondent Neville Lazarus spoke to Mr Ramesh in hospital and he said he was “okay”.

‘Miracle’ he escaped

Nayan Kumar Ramesh said he was supposed to be collecting his brother from Gatwick Airport on Thursday and the whole family planned to come together for a gathering this weekend.

“I’ve got no words to describe it,” he said. “It’s a miracle that he survived – but what about the other miracle for my other brother.”

Asked how he and his relatives were feeling, he replied: “Devastated. I’m scared to fly now – to even sit on a plane.”

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Footage shared widely on social media showed Mr Ramesh limping away from the crash site and being led towards emergency services.

He told Indian media he has lived in London for 20 years. According to the Hindustan Times report, Mr Ramesh is 40 – but official flight documents list his age as 38.

He told the newspaper his brother was sitting in a different row on the plane. “We visited Diu. He was travelling with me and I can’t find him anymore. Please help me find him.”

Three Britons dead

Three Britons have been confirmed to have died in the crash – all members of the same family.

Akeel Nanabawa, his wife Hannaa, and their four-year-old daughter Sara were among those who perished on the plane, Gloucester Muslim Community said on Facebook.

The aircraft departed Ahmedabad for London Gatwick at 1.38pm local time on Thursday, carrying 242 passengers and crew members.

They included 169 Indian nationals, 53 British nationals, seven Portuguese nationals and one Canadian national, the airline said.

According to tracking website Flightradar, a signal was last received from the plane less than a minute after it took off.

It then crashed into a medical school’s residential quarters in Meghaninagar, Ahmedabad, the largest city in Gujarat state.

In a statement, London Gatwick said the flight was due to land at 6.25pm UK time on Thursday and a reception centre for relatives of those on board is being set up where information and support will be provided.

The UK Foreign Office said it is “working with local authorities in India to urgently establish the facts and provide support to those involved”.

British nationals who require consular assistance are advised to call 020 7008 5000, while Air India has set up hotlines to provide information on +91 806 2779 200 for foreign nationals or 1800 5691 444 if calling from India.

Initially, an Ahmedabad city police commissioner claimed there appeared to be no survivors.

The local police chief later said that at least 204 bodies had been recovered from the crash site, according to Reuters.

Thursday’s is the first crash of a Boeing 787 Dreamliner in its history, according to the Aviation Safety Network database.

The model, a widebody, twin-engine plane, has made five million journeys in the 14 years since its first passenger flight.

Meanwhile, India’s prime minister Narendra Modi offered his condolences in a post on X.

“The tragedy in Ahmedabad has stunned and saddened us,” he wrote. “It is heartbreaking beyond words. In this sad hour, my thoughts are with everyone affected by it.”

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Thousands of jobs are at risk after discount high street chain Poundland was sold – with dozens of shops expected to shut.

Poundland has been sold for a headline figure of €1 to investment firm and former Laura Ashley owners Gordon Brothers, confirming Sky News reporting.

Its previous owners, the Poland-based Pepco Group, however, are to be repaid tens of millions of pounds as part of the sale.

Poundland employs roughly 16,000 people across an estate of over 800 shops in the UK and Ireland.

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Around 100 stores are expected to close, and rent reviews are also expected to be negotiated with Poundland landlords.

The chain, known for selling products for £1, was put on the market earlier this year after a downturn in trading. Employers’ tax hikes announced by Chancellor Rachel Reeves in the November budget increased the financial pressure on high street retailers.

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As part of the deal, a restructuring plan requiring High Court approval will take place. Details of that restructuring will be communicated in “due course”, owners Pepco said.

It will retain a minority stake in Poundland.

Pepco said the deal would help it shift away from food and drinks, improve its revenue growth and boost its profitability

Stephan Borchert, Pepco Group’s chief executive, said: “This transaction will strongly support our accelerated value creation programme by simplifying the group and focusing on our successful Pepco business.

“Poundland remains a key player in UK discount retail, with millions of customers annually and a well-loved brand and proposition.”

Economists suspected that the comfortable growth enjoyed at the beginning of the year might prove to be short-lived, and they appear to be right.

After expanding by 0.7% in the first quarter of the year, output struggled at the start of the second quarter, shrinking by 0.3% in April.

The damp performance is likely to continue, with economists expecting a 0.1% decline over the second quarter.

The dashboard is flashing warning signs.

The economic data for the start of the year was flattered by people bringing forward house purchases to beat the stamp duty holiday deadline as well as businesses racing to get orders out of the door to beat possible US tariffs.

Now that those temporary factors have faded away, we can better gauge the state of the economy. It makes for unpleasant reading.

A hobbled economy

We are still being hobbled by low growth and high taxes, and the two are reinforcing each other.

In a more detailed breakdown, the ONS revealed that the services sector shrank by 0.4%.

Although economists were expecting consumer spending to hold up, businesses are gripped by a crisis of confidence, with higher national insurance contributions forcing them to put up prices.

This led to a drop in sales. At the same time, the legal sector also came crashing down to earth following a drop in house purchases.

Consumers have less space than usual to absorb price rises, with utility bills on the up and general inflation proving persistent. Taxes are already at a generational high, and they could go higher if the economy disappoints.

The Chancellor Rachel Reeves‘s headroom against her fiscal rule is tight, with debt interest payments on the country’s debt eating into her room for manoeuvre.

A Reeves or a Trump problem?

The chancellor today pointed to factors outside of her control, hinting towards President Trump’s tariff policy.

Most of Britain’s problems are domestic ones – high government borrowing costs, rising cost of living pressures and higher taxation, but geopolitical forces have also conspired against us.

The production sector, which captures manufacturing, fell by 0.6%. This was driven by a 9.5% drop in the manufacturing of cars, with industry groups warning of a slump in export orders after Trump’s imposition of industry-wide tariffs at the end of March.

British officials are hopeful that the US will start lifting car tariffs this week after a deal was struck back in May, but it still hangs in the balance.

Even then, a new quota limits the scope for companies to grow in the US market. That’s bad news for the likes of JLR, the maker of Jaguars and Land Rovers.

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All this matters for a chancellor with a historically small fiscal headroom. Even small changes in the growth outlook could derail her plans, forcing further tax rises to pay for her spending plans.

She is betting big on investment in infrastructure- trains, nuclear power, social housing – but it could take many years for that to pay dividends, if it pays dividends at all.

In the meantime, the debt continues to grow as she borrows to fund those projects, putting further pressure on her budget to cover the interest payments alone.

It’s a painful feedback loop for the economy.