Nine years on, when a special Patiala court on Tuesday held three guilty of the hijacking, many passengers of IC-814 hold those eight days of captivity as a watershed event in their lives, the memories of which have at once strengthened them as human beings, forged closer ties with family and even with fellow passengers scattered all across India.

The importance of Tuesday had slipped Delhi-based surgeon Dr Sanjeev Chibber's mind. "I didn't know it was judgment day today. But nine years ago, each day had seemed like a year because no news of what was going on trickled down to us," he said. Six members of Chibber's family were on that flight.

While Chibber uses the events as an interesting anecdote for curious patients, his brother-in-law Arun Naithani, who was on board the plane, said, "I remember every moment on that plane. Me and my wife had spent long hours talking to our children about death. It seems so surreal now because we had almost come to believe in the possibility of death. But we have moved on and become stronger." In a lighter note, he said, "The best part was I lost a lot of weight in those eight days because there was hardly anything to eat!"

Sixty-year-old Naithani now lives in Dehradun. He said his daughter Kanika, who was also on that flight, had got married recently. He said, "We got over the trauma because there were six of us together. We were constantly comforting each other."

Naithani remembers his abductors as "courteous" and "friendly". "They thought I was from the Indian Army and, therefore, were always checking on me. Then I showed them my visiting card. It was unnerving to speak to them but they were not rough," he said. He added the hijackers were thorough professionals but slightly shaky. "They stabbed Rupin Katyal out of nervousness," he said.

On the other hand, flight engineer Anil K Jaggi, who wrote his memories in the book IC-814 Hijacked!, was not very forthcoming with his views on Tuesday's verdict. He said, "It has been a long time. I am happy for the people who went through that trauma."