They opened the box on a Sunday in late March, getting their first look at Asfan Mohammed since he departed India for Russia four months earlier.
He was better dressed than when he’d left – a black suit, white shirt, tie and shoes replacing the casual attire he’d worn when family and friends saw him off.
But he had to be buried in line with his Muslim beliefs, so his body would need to be prepared; the neat clothes removed.
It was then Imran Mohammad, 41, saw the extent of what had happened to his 31-year-old brother while fighting for the Russian armed forces in Vladimir Putin’s invasion of Ukraine.
“I saw holes on the back of his shoulder, his ribs right down till his lower back,” Imran told CNN.
“There were six to seven holes caused by a drone attack. It ripped through his body. There was internal damage. Two teeth were broken.”
And now this tight-knit family in Hyderabad, southern India was broken too. A husband, father and provider gone.
Imran’s business was also in ruins, rotted by neglect as he’d focused all his energies on finding out what happened to his brother on the battlefield of Europe’s bloodiest conflict since the Second World War.
Imran noted the time.
“I opened the box at 11 a.m. Sunday. When I saw his body for the first time, it hit me that he’s no more,” he said.
“My efforts to look for my brother, my two-month fight for my brother, came to a painful end. I wanted to react looking at his corpse, but I just couldn’t. I went totally numb.”
A dream lost
Asfan met an unlikely fate – one his family could never have imagined when Putin ordered Russian troops into Ukraine in February 2022.
At the time, the father of two managed a clothing store, one of almost 300 across India in the homegrown Allen Solly chain, selling kids’ clothes, wedding tuxedos and just about everything in between.
He’d been there eight years, his brother said.
It wasn’t the worst job, but Asfan wanted more for his wife and two children, ages 2 and 8 months. And he dreamed of taking them out of Hyderabad.
“He wanted to work in Australia,” where his sister-in-law and her family lived, Imran said. “They were calling him and his family there.”
But that meant Asfan would need a high score on the International English Language Testing System (IELTS), which gauges proficiency of non-native speakers.
“He wrote his IELTS. He didn’t do well,” Imran said. “He felt demotivated. He tried again.”
It didn’t work, Imran said.
But videos on YouTube about job opportunities in Russia gave Asfan new hope, and he contacted an employment agency, his brother said.
“He was going to work as a taxi driver or delivery boy in Russia – that process was on,” Imran said.
“Then a couple of days later the agents said there are vacancies for helper and security jobs in the Russian army. The agents assured him that this was the best job. They said he could get a Russian passport and national card within a year through which you could move around neighboring countries.”
Asfan thought that could be a stepping stone to his family’s dream life in Australia, his brother said.
Instead, his choice took him to the frigid, battle-scarred landscape of Ukraine.
Brainwashed
Asfan kept his plans secret from family and friends until it was too late to turn back, according to Imran, who said he only learned his brother was leaving three days before he set off for Russia on November 9 last year.
By that time, Asfan had paid more than $1,800 to the recruiters, who asked him not to speak to anyone, even his family, about his intention to travel.
“They had brainwashed him so much … They warned him he could be deported from Russia, from the airport,” Imran said. “I tried my level best to stop him.”
After a multi-stop route that took him through other Indian cities and the United Arab Emirates, Asfan arrived in Moscow on November 12.
A day later, he signed…
Read More: How a store manager from India ended up killed on the battlefields of Ukraine fighting for Russia